A study by the Erasmus MC shows that no less than 12 percent of Dutch women experience depression during pregnancy. Light therapy helps with this depression, the study shows. In this article we explain exactly how this works.
During this study, testing was done with both a group of pregnant women who underwent light therapy and a group of pregnant women who were exposed to a placebo.
Recognition
The Erasmus MC study shows that both the group exposed to light therapy and the placebo reported a reduction in depressive symptoms. "How this is possible is unknown," says Babette Bais, a scientific researcher who received her PhD for this research. In addition, Bais says that they think that a certain recognition of the problem plays a role in the alleviation of the symptoms.
If it doesn't help, it doesn't hurt
Light therapy is a welcome addition because currently, according to the guidelines, these types of depression are treated with psychotherapy or antidepressants.
Light therapy had already proven itself in normal depression and seasonal depression, the well-known winter depression, so Bais wondered whether it would also work in pregnant women with depression. “There were already two previous studies, but they were too small and therefore unreliable. Many factors play a role in pregnancy, take all those hormonal changes for example.”
Depression during pregnancy
Why so many women become depressed during pregnancy is also a mystery. “There are ideas about it: the change in hormone balance, sleep problems. From an evolutionary point of view, people find it strange, I often hear. In order to safeguard our reproduction, people would say that women should not be depressed during pregnancy.”
Bais then says: “That is why we set up a very extensive study, in which women were followed for a longer period of time, and in which we collected body material to do additional research. Light therapy for pregnancy depression has never been studied so extensively before.”
The results
The women were divided into two groups, one group receiving therapy with strong light, as mentioned, and the other with dim red light. “Depression scores improved by 41.2 to 50 percent in the strong light group, and by 45 to 58.6 percent in the dim red light group. Both groups underwent light therapy every day for half an hour, half an hour after waking up. Most women reported a positive effect on their depression.”
How that positive effect was achieved is being further investigated. “We took urine, hair and saliva for cortisol and melatonin measurements. And the women wore an activity monitor during those six weeks, which can say something about their sleep pattern. All that data still needs to be analyzed. But I conclude that light therapy may be a safe, effective and cheap alternative to pharmacological treatment of pregnancy depression.”
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