Assessing the risk of postnatal depression in mothers receiving the health visiting service: a best practice implementation project.

Objectives: The project aimed to assess health visitors' concordance with evidence-based criteria regarding identification and support of postnatal depression in mothers receiving the health visiting service.

Introduction: Timely identification is critical to support mothers at risk of postnatal depression. Undetected and untreated postnatal depression can result in severe consequences for the mother's health, infant health and development, and well-being of the family as a whole. Due to their unique role of universal home visiting, health visitors are ideally placed to identify and support mothers, and evidence-based practice is key to positive outcomes.

Methods: A baseline audit was carried out using evidence-based audit and feedback informed by the JBI Model for EBHC and guided by the seven-phase implementation framework, involving 12 health visitors and 60 health visiting records from one health board in Wales, UK. The first step involved project development and generating evidence. A baseline audit was completed and a training program on perinatal and infant mental health was implemented. Finally, a post-implementation audit was completed involving 6 health visitors and 30 health visiting records.

Results: Receiving training in perinatal and infant mental health resulted in an improvement in baseline audit results. Health visitor concordance with best practice guidelines increased, with three of the six criteria in the post-implementation audit reaching 100% concordance, and two other criteria increasing to 83% and 93%, respectively.

Conclusion: The implementation project achieved improvements in concordance with best practice recommendations for identifying and supporting mothers experiencing, or at risk of experiencing, postnatal depression.

Spanish abstract: http://links.lww.com/IJEBH/A293.