Effects of physical activity during early pregnancy on postpartum depressive symptoms
GAN Yuexin, ZHANG Jun, CHEN Dan
Ministry of Education and Shanghai Key Laboratory of Children's Environmental Health, Xinhua Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200092, China
Abstract:Objective To explore the relationship between physical activity during early pregnancy and postpartum depressive symptoms. Methods We conducted a prospective study of 2 580 women and explored the relationship between physical activity during early pregnancy (0-16 weeks) and postpartum depressive symptoms at 6 weeks. Physical activity was assessed during the first trimester by the social support inventory and postpartum depressive symptoms at 6 weeks were assessed using the Edinburgh postnatal depression scale. The prevalence of postpartum depression symptoms in this study was 11.4% (cutoff: 9/10). In the statistical analysis process, continuous variables (log-converted total scores) and categorical variables (divided the total score into four equal groups) were used for analysis. A logistic regression model was used to analyze the relationship between physical activity and postpartum depressive symptoms. Results Compared with the low physical activity group, the risk of postpartum depressive symptoms decreased in the moderate physical activity group (OR=0.74, 95% CI: 0.57-0.95; aOR=0.77, 95% CI: 0.59-1.01). Compared with the low physical activity group, the risk of postpartum depressive symptoms increased in the high physical activity group (OR=1.35, 95% CI: 0.51-3.55; aOR=1.24, 95% CI: 0.45-3.40). Conclusion The association between physical activity during early pregnancy and postpartum depressive symptoms may vary with the magnitude of the activity.