RI Hospital: Sleep & Post-Partum Depression Study

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Wednesday, July 13, 2011

GoLocalProv Health Team

Nearly every pregnant woman or new mother experiences changes in her sleep during and after pregnancy. Yet, little is known about how those sleep changes influence a woman’s mood during pregnancy and the postpartum period. With this in mind, researchers from Rhode Island Hospital are recruiting pregnant women for the Pregnancy & Postpartum Sleep Research Study in partnership with Women & Infants Hospital and The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University.

Funded by a grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), The Pregnancy & Postpartum Sleep Research Study will measure the sleep patterns, light exposure, and melatonin levels of women from the third trimester of pregnancy to four months postpartum. The data will be used to identify whether a subgroup of women are vulnerable to postpartum mood disorders related to their sleep patterns. Understanding why some women experience mood changes after their babies are born could help researchers create sleep strategies to avoid postpartum mood disorders.

Do you qualify? Do you know someone who does?

The study is recruiting 125 participants. To take part, women should be between 18 to 40 years of age, currently pregnant and have a history of depression or bipolar disorder. Participants will have their sleep measured for four weeks: one week during the third trimester of pregnancy and one week each at two, six and 16 weeks after the baby is born. Monitoring will include wearing a wrist activity monitor and light sensor, completing a sleep diary, providing saliva samples and completing mood assessments.

Katherine Sharkey, M.D., Ph.D., a sleep medicine physician at Rhode Island Hospital and assistant professor in Medicine and Psychiatry & Human Behavior at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, is leading this study. Dr. Sharkey is also medical director of the University Medicine Sleep Center and associate director of the Sleep for Science Research Laboratory of Brown University.

Study participants will be compensated for their time and effort. For more information on the study, call Beth at 421-9440 or visit www.sleepforscience.org.