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Poorly Funded Mental Health Services, New Mums Suffering
NEW MUMS SUFFERING DUE TO POORLY FUNDED MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES
Maternal Care Action Group (MCAGNZ), is delivering a petition to parliament this month on Mother’s Day (May 14th) requesting funding for new mothers to receive help for anxiety or depression. Up to 97% of new mothers with depression or anxiety do not fit Maternal Mental Health criteria at their local District Health Board and MCAGNZ spokesperson Kristina Paterson is saying the lack of funded services means that there are delays in identifying and holistically treating depression and anxiety and few affordable options available to women.
“Not only does this mean an increase in severity of her illness and risk of suicide for a woman experiencing depression, but it also puts her child at more risk of mental health issues, learning difficulties, addictions and delinquency.”
North Shore mum Kelly Stoddard reports she is still waiting to receive help for her postnatal depression. Her symptoms started in the last stage of her pregnancy, yet anxiety/depression was not picked up till baby was nearly six weeks old. “I felt helpless and sad – felt like I had no support and was constantly crying. When I was pregnant, I was anxious about the unknown: when was my baby going to be born? Would he be healthy? When he was born, I constantly felt like I was failing him and was not sure I was doing the right thing.”
Ms Stoddard saw her GP but did not meet Maternal Mental Health criteria and was told to return to her GP for medication, and this was the only help that was offered to her. “Not everyone wants to mask the issue, they want to know why it’s happening to them” says Ms Stoddard.
MCAGNZ has a petition appealing for perinatal depression and anxiety to be better addressed in this year's budget by increasing funding of primary care services and better resourcing midwives through training. They are calling for all those that would support more funded holistic services for women like Kelly Stoddard to sign their petition, which can be found at this link: https://our.actionstation.org.nz/p/fundpnd
ENDS
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