Treatment of Intrapartum Depression Using Non-invasive Photobiomodulation

Depression is common in pregnancy and affects about 70% of women and, for many women, pregnancy can lead to the first episode of major depression. Complications of intrapartum depression include intrauterine growth restriction, preterm labor, low birthweight, gestational diabetes, preeclampsia, decreased prenatal follow-up and suicide. For this reason, the standard of care has been to screen for depression during pregnancy and treat this illness, reducing maternal and fetal morbidity. Unfortunately, many first-line pharmacological approaches, such as serotonin reuptake inhibitors, may cause fetal malformations, persistent pulmonary hypertension and withdrawal syndrome. Thus, a non-pharmacological approach, without risk of fetal complications, would be ideal. The investigators propose a photobiomodulation based approach that uses non-ionizing near-infrared light (IRL) to upregulate mitochondrial function (through modulation of cytochrome c oxidase activity), which in-turn increase neurosteroid production and modulates GABAA receptor activity, thus alleviating depression. The investigators will perform a pilot study using IRL for the treatment of intrapartum depression. While other trials have shown success using IRL for depression in non-pregnant patients, this will confirm that photobiomodulation can modulate mitochondrial function and mitigate depressive symptoms compared to untreated controls in pregnancy by using real-time app-based depression scoring system and neuroimaging.