Practical Resources for Effective Postpartum Parenting (PREPP)
PREPP is a brief, evidenced-based intervention modeled around the conceptualization of postpartum depression as a potential disorder of the dyad, and one that can be approached through preventative psychological and behavioral changes in the mother that affect her and the child — even before birth.
PREPP is designed for pregnant women at-risk for postpartum depression and many different health care providers can be trained to become PREPP ‘coaches’. PREPP helps establish more realistic postpartum expectations, enhance parenting confidence, and protect sleep via supporting infant regulatory behavior and improving parental affect regulation. PREPP consists of targeted psychotherapy and infant behavior interventions that can be offered in conjunction with routine perinatal medical visits. Specific PREPP components are:
- Caregiving strategies aimed at reducing infant fuss and cry behavior and increasing infant sleep
- Self-reflection and mindfulness skills
- Psychoeducation about the postpartum period and infant behavior
To learn more about PREPP, here are several of our PREPP publications:
Practical resources for effective postpartum parenting (PREPP): A randomized controlled trial of a novel parent-infant dyadic intervention to reduce symptoms of postpartum depression.
Grubb, M. D., Wilson, C. A., Zhang, Z., Liu, G., Lee, S., Monk, C., & Werner, E. A. (2024). American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology MFM, 6(12), 101526. Advance online publication.
Perinatal depression prevention through the mother-infant dyad: The role of maternal childhood maltreatment.
Berry, O. O., Babineau, V., Lee, S., Feng, T., Scorza, P., Werner, E. A., & Monk, C. (2021). Journal of Affective Disorders, 290, 188–196.
Pregnancy-specific stress and sensitive caregiving during the transition to motherhood in adolescents.
Scorza, P., Merz, E. C., Spann, M., Steinberg, E., Feng, T., Lee, S., Werner, E., Peterson, B. S., & Monk, C. (2021). BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, 21(1), 458.
PREPP: Postpartum depression prevention through the mother-infant dyad.
Werner, E. A., Gustafsson, H. C., Lee, S., Feng, T., Jiang, N., Desai, P., & Monk, C. (2016). Archives of Women's Mental Health, 19(2), 229–242.