Background: Up to 20% of women and 10% of men suffer from mental health problems such as depression or anxiety disorders during pregnancy until 1 year after birth (perinatal period). If left untreated, these problems often have negative consequences for the parent, but most importantly for child development and child health. They also result in high economic costs, for example in the education and social sector. Many countries therefore prioritise measures to improve mental health around birth.

Method: This report provides a mapping of the Austrian prevention and care structure based on publicly available information.

Results: There are no valid data on the prevalence of perinatal mental health problems in Austria. Applying the international prevalence data to Austria, we can assume about 16,000 affected mothers and 8,000 affected fathers per year. Currently there is no systematic screening for perinatal mental illness in Austria, as recommended and implemented in other countries. The recommended integration of such a screening into the national screening programme (Mutter-Kind-Pass) has not yet been implemented. There is also a lack of defined care pathways for different degrees of severity of perinatal mental problems. Although there are several services that can be used by parents with perinatal mental health illness (e.g. ‘Frühe Hilfen’), specialised perinatal mental health care is only available to a limited extent and not in every Austrian region. The number of available mother-child beds for severe mental health problems after childbirth deviates significantly from international recommendations.

Discussion and conclusion: The current care situation reflects a low health and socio-political priority of the topic. In addition to reducing regional inequalities and improving specialised services, an improvement of the situation must also focus on the structural determinants of mental illness during the perinatal period (e.g. risk of poverty, domestic violence, lack of social support).