Authors: Antigoni Sarantaki, Victoria G. Vivilaki.
Immigrant families form a quickly changing multicultural context in many European countries and particularly in Greece. This study is a narrative review regarding postpartum depression within the refugee/immigrant population, in an attempt to increase understanding of immigrant women’s mental health care postnatally. First, we provided a brief review regarding the causes and symptoms of postpartum depression; moreover, we presented the already established bibliography concerning the immigrant/refugee population. Finally, we present several coping strategies that can be applied for dealing with such occurrences. Depression rates are higher among immigrants and refugees than in the general population due to their living conditions. New immigrant mothers may often be particularly vulnerable to less than optimal mental health following childbirth given the cultural and geographic isolation, socioeconomic factors, gender roles, and language difficulties that influence their postpartum experiences. Refugee women’s mental health issues often go unrecognized.
Maternity health professionals, especially midwives, should recognize the inequalities and provide culturally sensitive health care services and help to design tailored prevention programs in order to protect women in these population groups from postpartum depression.
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