Screening women for distress during pregnancy: the impact of including ‘Possibly’ as a response option

ABSTRACT

Objectives

To investigate the impact of including the response option of ‘Possibly’ in the Distress question on the Matthey Generic Mood Questionnaire (MGMQ) during antenatal emotional health screening in English-speaking women.

Background

Some distress screening questions only allow respondents to choose between ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to the presence of distress. The MGMQ, however, allows respondents to chose between ‘Yes’, ‘Possibly’, or ‘No’, which may be preferable if a participant is reluctant to state she definitely feels distressed.

Method

In Study 1, women undergoing routine antenatal psychosocial screening were allocated to either completing the MGMQ Distress question with the usual three-option response format of ‘Yes, Possibly, No’ (N = 960), or just a ‘Yes, No’ response format (N = 771). The proportion of responses were compared in each group, as were the proportion then screening positive on the MGMQ’s Bother question. In Study 2, women (N = 113) attending routine antenatal clinic appointments were asked about their preference between these response formats.

Results

Including ‘Possibly’ resulted in only a slight increase in the proportion giving a positive response to the Distress question, and then also screening positive on the Bother question. In Study 2, a substantial majority of women (80%) preferred having ‘Possibly’ in the response options.

Conclusion

While the impact of including ‘Possibly’ is small, it allows for more women to communicate how they are feeling on the full MGMQ. Given the large majority of women preferring having ‘Possibly’ included, we believe that the Distress Question is enhanced by having this as a response option.

KEYWORDS:

• Perinatal mental health screening
• measurement
• antenatal depression
• distress
• acceptability

Acknowledgments

Study 1: We thank Emma Black, Jo Farrell, Kristina Talcevska and Tegan Murray for collection and management of data for the overarching PIPA Project. Sincere thanks to Royal Hospital for Women staff, in particular the midwives, and the women who have contributed their time, experiences and insights to the PIPA Project.

Study 2: We thank the Antenatal Clinic staff of Liverpool Public Hospital, and the women who gave their time and insights into the screening questions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

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Notes

1. This approval was obtained following a formal complaint to the Committee’s Chair by the PI regarding the Committee’s treatment of the ethics application.

Additional information

Funding

MPA, NR, and VM thank St John of God Health Care for infrastructure funding for Study 1. NR thanks Australian Rotary Health and the University of Newcastle (2018-2020), and the University of Wollongong (2020-2023), for postdoctoral fellowship funding support. The funding bodies had no involvement in the design of this study, analysis or interpretation of data, writing of the manuscript or decision to submit the article for publication.