Assessment of Postpartum Stress Using the Maternal Postpartum Stress Scale (MPSS) in Spanish Women

Abstract

Although scales that evaluate postpartum stress exist, they lack specificity in maternal postpartum stress. The MPSS was created because there was a need to assess maternal stress during the postpartum stage. The introduction of the MPSS has enriched the evaluation tools for postpartum stress and has helped understand maternal stress at various postpartum time points and identify women at high risk for postpartum stress during this period. The aim was to translate the MPSS into Spanish and study its psychometric properties. Postpartum women (N = 167) with a mean age of 34.26 (SD = 4.71) were involved in this study. In addition to the MPSS, a battery of instruments was administered: a demographic sheet, the Birth Satisfaction Scale-Revised (BSS-R) and the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS). The MPSS data were analyzed, checking item communality first. As a result, three items showed unsatisfactory communality values (h2 p = 0.05 and above). To conclude, the MPSS will contribute to the existing literature, having a wider capacity to assess perinatal mental health difficulties in Spanish-speaking populations.

Keywords

• maternal postpartum stress scale (MPSS)
• Spanish women
• surveys and questionnaires