Maternal mental health and the GP’s role
With the ongoing national independent investigations into maternity and neonatal services, and the formation of the National Maternity and Neonatal Taskforce, policymakers, clinicians, and academics are exploring strategies for making UK maternity care safer, more equitable, and responsive. Perinatal mental health provision has repeatedly been flagged as an area where standards of care fall short, with perinatal mental health conditions disproportionately affecting deprived and minoritised groups. The Mothers and Babies: Reducing Risk through Audits and Confidential Enquiries (MBRRACE) report of 2025 demonstrated that, in the UK between 2021 and 2023, maternal suicides remained the leading cause of deaths between 6 weeks and 1 year after pregnancy.1 Maternal suicides represent not only potentially preventable deaths, which have a devastating impact on the child and family, but also the ‘tip of the iceberg’, with many more women living with perinatal mental health conditions unable to access appropriate care.
Concurrently, UK general practice is facing significant challenges, with access and continuity of care often limited, mounting administrative burdens, and GPs being asked to ‘do more with less’. GPs remain the chief gatekeepers to most secondary care services, including perinatal mental health care. National guidance places GPs at the forefront of community perinatal mental health provision. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) clinical guideline CG192 on antenatal and postnatal mental health2 advises healthcare professionals to direct postnatal women with all but the most severe mental health conditions to their GP. Similarly, the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ perinatal guidance states: ‘mild to moderate disorders should usually be managed by primary care services or …
