The Maternal Mental Health Alliance (MMHA) has today published maps showing that pregnant women and new mums in a quarter of the UK still cannot access lifesaving specialist perinatal mental health services which meet national guidelines.
According to the MMHA just 7% of areas in Scotland are showing green on the map meaning specialist perinatal mental health services are available for women in that area.
Commenting on the maps and statistics, Emma Currer the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) Scotland lead on maternal mental health, said:“Ensuring Scotland has the perinatal mental health services it needs is hugely important. If women do not get the support needed the consequences can be incredibly serious, indeed, fatal.
“As the map for Scotland shows the Scottish Government and NHS still have much to do to improve the situation around perinatal mental health because there are clearly significant gaps in services. From these figures we are certainly lagging behind England and Wales in making improvements and this needs addressing.
“There is though work going on behind the scenes to look at what services Scotland has and where there are gaps. I hope this will bear fruit so that we can plug those gaps and give women the help, support and care they need and deserve.”
The RCM also published a report on maternal mental health in July 2017, ‘Every mother must get the help they need’ which can be read on the RCM website at https://www.rcm.org.uk/
The MMHA UK, Scotland, England, Northern Ireland and Wales maps can be seen on the MMHA website at http://www.
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