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Recent studies have shown that even preschoolers can have major depressive syndromes (Arch Gen Psychiatry 2009; 66:897) and that psychopathology in school-age children varies with maternal depression (NEJM JW Psychiatry May 3 2006). Building on these data, researchers examined possible ways to protect preschoolers from maternal depression by analyzing data on 1759 preschoolers in the Québec Longitudinal Study of Child Development, which included mothers' repeated assessments of their depressive symptoms and of their children's behaviors from ages 17 to 60 months.
Among children whose mothers had high self-reported depressive symptoms, group day care was associated with better functioning on a measure of emotional problems (but not separation anxiety), compared with care by the mother, relative, or babysitter. In this group, lower social withdrawal symptoms were associated with group day care compared with maternal care. Whether the child entered day care before or after age 17 months did not affect results.
Herba CM et al. Maternal depressive symptoms and children's emotional problems: Can early child care help children of depressed mothers? JAMA Psychiatry 2013 Jun 19; [e-pub ahead of print]. (http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2013.1361)
Comment
The reliance on the mothers' ratings limits this study's results. Still, they demonstrate that daytime “parentectomy” — day care settings outside the family — significantly lessens psychopathology in the offspring of depressed mothers. The findings have public health implications — increasing day care use, with financial supplements for those unable to afford it, could prevent the later cost of psychiatric treatment of at-risk children. Clinicians treating depressed mothers of preschoolers should encourage them to use day care.