The prevalence of panic disorder in pregnant women during the third trimester of pregnancy

Guler, Ozkan; Sahin, Figen Kir; Emul, H. Murat; Ozbulut, Omer; Gecici, Omer; Uguz, Faruk; Gezginc, Kazim; Zeytinci, Ismet Esra; Karatayli, Savas; Askin, Rustem

doi:10.1016/j.comppsych.2007.08.008

« Previous Next »Comprehensive Psychiatry
Volume 49, Issue 2 , Pages 154-158, March 2008

The prevalence of panic disorder in pregnant women during the third trimester of pregnancy

Ozkan Guler
- Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Afyonkarahisar Kocatepe University, 03200 Afyon, Turkey
- Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 272 217 1753; fax: +90 272 213 30 66.
Figen Kir Sahin
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Faculty of Medicine, Kocatepe University, 03200 Afyon, Turkey
H. Murat Emul
- Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Afyonkarahisar Kocatepe University, 03200 Afyon, Turkey
Omer Ozbulut
- Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Afyonkarahisar Kocatepe University, 03200 Afyon, Turkey
Omer Gecici
- Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Afyonkarahisar Kocatepe University, 03200 Afyon, Turkey
Faruk Uguz
- Department of Psychiatry, Meram Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya 42080, Turkey
Kazim Gezginc
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Meram Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya 42080, Turkey
Ismet Esra Zeytinci
- Department of Psychiatry, Meram Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya 42080, Turkey
Savas Karatayli
- Department of Psychiatry, Meram Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya 42080, Turkey
Rustem Askin
- Department of Psychiatry, Meram Faculty of Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya 42080, Turkey

published online 22 October 2007.

Abstract

Objective

The principal aim of this study was to assess the current prevalence rate of panic disorder (PD) in pregnant women during the third trimester of pregnancy. The second aim of the present study was to investigate the clinical characteristics of PD in pregnant and nonpregnant women.

Method

The study data were gathered from 512 consecutive women in the third trimester of pregnancy who were admitted to the obstetric outpatient clinics of 2 university research centers. The diagnosis of PD was determined by means of the Structured Clinical Interview for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition Axis I disorders in the third trimester of pregnancy. Within the same period, the Panic and Agoraphobia Scale was used to determine the severity of PD. In addition, we compared the clinical characteristics of PD in gravid subjects (n = 13) with their control group. A control group was composed of 19 consecutive nonpregnant female outpatients diagnosed with PD who presented to the psychiatric outpatient clinics of the same hospitals.

Results

The prevalence rate of PD was found to be 2.5% (n = 13) among the subjects in the third trimester of pregnancy. Of these 13 pregnant, 7 subjects reported that PD developed during the 6th to 28th weeks of their gestation, and the number of subjects who experienced PD symptoms before pregnancy was 6. In addition, there was no statistically difference between gravid and nongravid PD cases with regard to the severity of panic symptoms.

Conclusion

Our study suggests that PD may be common among pregnant females during the third trimester of pregnancy and seems to be associated with similar clinical features during gestation and nongestation.