‘You, Me, Baby’: Quebec researchers develop online tool to prevent post-partum depression

Almost a year after its launch, results are encouraging for the digital tool “You, Me, Baby,” which aims to help moms when they encounter emotional challenges, depression or anxiety during pregnancy and afterwards.

Over 34,000 people have already used the free website, which offers a self-care program targeting future or new parents to help them prevent stress — all the way from pregnancy to the child’s first birthday.

Topics covered include stress management, coping with thoughts, co-parenting, relaxation and mindfulness.

Perinatal depression affects 10-20 per cent of pregnant women. The tool was designed to reduce barriers to mental health care for mothers, whether due to fear of stigmatization or accessibility of resources, explained Sylvana Côté, researcher at CHU Sainte-Justine.

She was accompanied by Martin St-André, child psychiatrist at CHU Sainte-Justine, and Cindy Lee Dennis, professor of nursing and psychiatry at the University of Toronto, when they presented the tool’s initial results at the Canadian National Perinatal Research Conference in Montreal.

“It’s a program we developed with a lot of different types of users in mind, and we wanted to design it as a tool that, on a simple level, promotes well-being during a period of great transformation,” said St-André.

“Perinatal depression is a condition that is very varied in terms of its clinical presentation,” he continued. “The biology is still very mysterious, and we still have a lot of work to do. There are obviously all the psychological factors and all the social determinants … but the manifestations vary enormously from one family to another.”

Increases baby’s social development

“You, Me, Baby” is an adaptation of the scientifically validated American “Mothers and Babies” program. The Quebec version was developed by a clinical and research team at CHU Sainte-Justine. Parents who use the tool can benefit from the expertise in perinatal mental health of one of America’s leading pediatric centres.

“We now have convincing results showing that ‘You, Me, Baby’ is effective in preventing post-partum depression and improving the well-being of parents,” said Isabelle Demers, the CEO of CHU Sainte-Justine.

A study has confirmed that this self-care program, combined with regular medical follow-ups, led to a reduction in post-partum depression symptoms in women with mild to moderate symptoms during pregnancy when compared to doing perinatal follow-up alone.

The study involved a randomized sample of 510 Quebec women with mild-to-moderate depressive symptoms during the second trimester of pregnancy. Half followed the program online only, while the other half received weekly telephone support. This sample was compared with an observational database of 1,388 women who had received the usual follow-up of a home nursing visit before and after delivery.

Women who followed the “You, Me, Baby” program had significantly fewer depressive symptoms in the postnatal period than when they were recruited for the study and also compared with women in the observation group.

The effect was the same with or without telephone support. This weekly follow-up did, however, show that the mothers had a greater sense of efficacy in their ability to cope with their daily lives at three months postpartum.

“Another thing that improved was the baby’s social ability,” Côté said.

From three to six months, the baby’s social development translates into interactions with smiling and looking in the mirror, she summarized, and all that has increased. She noted that these results were under review before publication.

“You, Me, Baby” is a project from the Plan d’action interministériel en santé mentale 2022-2026 to improve access to care without burdening the system and is also part of the Plan d’action en périnatalité et en petite enfance 2023-2028.

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews