Bipolar affective disorder, pregnancy and childbirth: clinical characteristics and heredity

Abstract

Bipolar affective disorder has higher frequency among women of reproductive age and can relapse both during pregnancy and immediately after childbirth. The presence of family history is one of the leading risk factors for bipolar affective disorder. A cross-sectional study was performed as part of a large naturalistic study. It included 81 women with pronounced symptoms of bipolar disorder who required hospitalization. The clinical method included comprehensive assessment of patients in the cohort, assessment of the severity of symptoms and the family history. The results showed that more than 50% of the women were at an average age of 25 years and experienced bipolar affective disorder mostly in the first and third trimester, whereas, in the puerperal period, the risk was highest in the first two weeks after childbirth. There was previous history of bipolar affective disorder in about 50% of the women. In 55.6% of the women, there was family history of bipolar affective disorder. The presence of previous history of bipolar affective disorder, first-degree family history and pregnancy at later age were shown to be risk factors for a new relapse during pregnancy and after childbirth. Clinical expression of manic–psychotic symptoms was more typical of the period of lactation than manic symptoms, which were associated rather with younger age and the period of pregnancy. In the studied cohort of patients, the risk of repeatability of affective episodes was significantly higher with each subsequent pregnancy.

Keywords

• Bipolar affective disorder
• pregnancy
• heredity
• post-partum period
• de novo mutations