First-case postpartum psychoses in Eastern Turkey: a clinical case and follow-up study

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the clinico-demographic features and long-term course of postpartum psychosis (PPP). Method: A total of 64 in-patients with psychotic postpartum disorder, who w ere admitted for the first time to a psychiatry clinic, were reexamined ret rospectively and then compared with 64 control patients. Follow-up investig ation was carried out either by interviewing the patients personally or wit h the help of general practitioners (GPs). All patients were rediagnosed ac cording to DSM-IV. Results: The majority of PPP patients were young, married, primiparae, had a low educational level and were living in rural areas. The mean onset time of PPP after delivery was 3.62 weeks. More than 75% of the patients with P PP had further psychotic episodes during the follow-up period of 11 years; 42% of the puerperal cases were diagnosed as schizophrenia at the follow-up investigation, and 59.3% of the patients had confuso-oneiroid syndrome. Conclusion: These findings, unlike those of the Western studies, demonstrat e that PPP is not uniform in different populations.