Co-designing perinatal mental health support in Tyrol

Becoming a parent can be a time of distress and social change for new mothers and fathers. Mental illness is the most common complication associated with pregnancy and affects 1 in 5 mothers and 1 in 10 fathers. Mothers may experience a lack of social support, which can also lead to baby blues or postnatal depression. New fathers often experience changes in their social and daily life, which sometimes lead to depressive symptoms. Many new parents go undiagnosed, fearful of possible stigma of asking for help, or unsure who to ask. Services are often fragmented, with limited options to maintain the parent-infant connection while receiving medical treatment. Perinatal mental illness (PMI), if not treated, can lead to emotional and developmental and attachment issues for parents, infant, and child longer term. This project will examine the situation for new parents in Tyrol and aims to support an early intervention and prevention approach to respond to PMI. The projec t aims to: 1. Examine the situation in Tyrol for perinatal mental health support/services 2. Co-design support services that focus on parent and infant need, strengthening social support and collaborative services 3. Implement the design of the intervention to be sustainable, feasible, and acceptable 4. Evaluate the impact, views, and experiences of the intervention This project is made up of a medical, health, and social care policy team and will design, implement, and evaluate two practices approaches: (1) the sensitive identification process of parents experiencing mental illness during pregnancy and the perinatal period, (2) and support for parents to enhance formal and informal supports, focused on their family needs . This will be done over 5 years with open innovation science (OIS) approaches engaging the public in Tyrol. We will work with stakeholders to co-design the practice approaches based on evidence-based approaches and determine the most appropriate study design together. This social innovation project brings together the local knowledge of systems, healthcare, social care, along with international expertise in co-design, complex evaluations and social services research to address an issue of true local importance within society. We take an early intervention and prevention approach to bring together formal and informal services working with new parents and infants and consider the ways in which supports can be enhanced to increase parent-infant quality of life. Our international and interdisciplinary research team includes researchers from a range of disciplines, including social sciences, psychology, health economics, health services research, applied linguistics, implementation science, and psychiatry. This will be a partnership between local stakeholders, drawing from international knowledge of best-practice, and together designing, implementing, evaluating, and sustaining a strengthened support offer for new parents and their infants experiencing perinatal mental illness.