Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Neurosciences, McMaster University, Chedoke Site, Central Building, Room 310, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON, L8S 4K1, Canada. ferroma@mcmaster.ca
The objectives were to (1) document the risk of clinical depression in mothers in the 24 months after epilepsy diagnosis in their children, (2) determine whether the probability of risk of clinical depression changes over time, and (3) identify factors predictive of risk of clinical depression.
Data were obtained from the Health Related Quality of Life in Children with Epilepsy Study, a national prospective study of children 4-12 years old with new-onset epilepsy followed for 24 months. Risk-free survival was calculated using the life table approach. Binary sequence modeling for longitudinal data was implemented to identify risk factors.
A total of 210 mothers were included in the analysis. Twenty-eight percent of mothers without clinically relevant levels of depressive symptoms at baseline were at risk for clinical depression by 24 months. The probability for risk of clinical depression and associated 95% confidence intervals by 6, 12, and 24 months was 0.13 (0.08, 0.18), 0.12 (0.07, 0.17), and 0.19 (0.10, 0.27), respectively. Significant predictors (p