Women who continue with unintended pregnancies are less depressed than those who abort

Married women who carry an unintended first pregnancy to term are at less risk of subsequent depression than women who abort. Among unmarried women, however, the risk of high rates of depression is comparable. Reardon and Cougle report (p 151) the follow up of a nationwide cohort of 12 686 American youths aged 14-21. The authors concede that their findings should be interpreted with caution since the shame of having an abortion makes some women conceal that they have had one.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to StumbleUpon StumbleUpon   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?

Relevant Article

Depression and unintended pregnancy in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth: a cohort study
David C Reardon and Jesse R Cougle
BMJ 2002 324: 151-152. [Extract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ