Maternal Perinatal Stress

Maternal Perinatal Stress is a collection of open access articles created by COST Action 22114: “Maternal Perinatal Stress and Adverse Outcomes in the Offspring: Maximising infants´ development (TREASURE)”. This Collection welcomes a diversity of article types offered by Open Research Europe, including research articles, reviews, case studies, data notes, method articles, essays, and more, and facilitates the dissemination of all research outputs as openly and quickly as possible. The objective of this collection is to present the diversity of the work in the TREASURE. These articles aim to reach the TREASURE's overarching goal of introducing and advancing maternal perinatal stress at every level of education, and in clinical and public health research and practice.

In order to improve fetal development and boost infant´s health throughout their lifespan, the TREASURE project aims to consolidate a multidisciplinary and international network of scientists, clinicians, students, stakeholders, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and Enterprises to achieve impact through a three-fold main objective:

1. Discovering, reviewing and disseminating scientific evidence on minimize, reduce and prevent the impact of maternal perinatal stress on fetal development, and to improve psychological, medical and neural development in the offspring during their life-span; 
2. Bridging knowledge, evidence and experience between scientific disciplines, and bringing international research groups together to increase knowledge exchange between countries. 
3. Forming international coalitions to efficiently translate scientific knowledge into clinical guidelines and best practices across Europe to improve the health of children, and reducing economic cost appearing from high levels of maternal perinatal stress.

These objectives will be achieved through six Working Groups.

WG1: Maximising our understanding of maternal perinatal psychological and physiological stress aims to conceptualise maternal perinatal stress along with the psychological and biological factors involved.

• Subgroup 1 - Definition of maternal stress
• Subgroup 2 - Qualitative research on maternal perceptions of stress
• Subgroup 3 - Development of a tool to assess maternal stress
• Subgroup 4 - Secondary data analyses on psychological stress impact

WG2: Exploring intergenerational and transgenerational impact of maternal perinatal stress on the offspring through epigenetic and biomedical research aims to increase knowledge on the biological predictors associated with short-, long- and very long-term adverse consequences in the offspring.

• Subgroup 1 - Secondary data analyses to identify adverse outcomes in neonates

WG3: Improving assessment approaches in perinatal maternal stress through psychological and biological measures aims to stimulate knowledge on which measures better predict adverse outcomes in the offspring.

• Subgroup 1 - Biological markers of maternal perinatal stress with an impact on exposed children
• Subgroup 2 - Psychological markers of maternal perinatal stress with an impact on exposed children
• Subgroup 3 - Markers of paternal perinatal stress with an impact on exposed children
• Subgroup 4 - Secondary data analysis from Birth Cohort studies of perinatal stress
• Subgroup 5 - Survey of clinicians of the acceptability and feasibility to use markers/assesments in the daily routine

WG4: Optimising the perinatal period to reduce the adverse impact on the offspring aims to stimulate the healthy development of the fetus in order to improve positive outcomes.

• Subgroup 1 - Qualitative Interviews with families & partners
• Subgroup 2 - Development of a psycho-educational toolkit for families
• Subgroup 3 - Critical assessment of methods improving the parent-infant relationship
• Subgroup 4 - Interventions reducing perinatal maternal stress

WG5: Analysis of health economics aims to study the economic burden of adverse infant outcomes due to maternal perinatal stress and the cost-effectiveness of identified interventions.

• Subgroup 1: Underpinning research with stakeholder engagement

WG6: Communication, dissemination and knowledge transfer aims to communicate, disseminate and transfer outputs from this COST Action to the scientific community, clinicians, policymakers, stakeholders, women, partners and families.

Collection advisors: Rafael Caparros-Gonzalez (University of Granada, Spain), Jean Calleja-Agius (University of Malta, Malta)