Vic: Victorian Coroner warns of dangers on post-natal depression

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Vic: Victorian Coroner warns of dangers on post-natal depression

By Darrin Barnett

MELBOURNE, Dec 13 AAP - A Victorian coroner today recommended a range of safety measuresfor those taking the popular antidepressant dothiepin as treatment for postnatal depression.

Coroner Jacinta Heffey made the recommendations as part of her findings into the deathsof two Victorian women from an overdose of the drug while suffering the condition.

Ms Heffey recommended that medical practitioners should be alerted to the perils associatedwith an overdose of the drug, and be "encouraged to exercise particular caution in termsof the amount of repeats and the method of dispensing".

Dosage should be limited to a few days' supply at a time during the acute phase ofthe illness, and measures should be taken to avoid stockpiling of the drug, she said.

Packaging should be altered to less than the current monthly supply, and families shouldadopt a "whole of family approach", whereby a trusted family member would in some casestake over the administering of the drug.

Debra Smeeton, 34, from Beechworth in north-eastern Victoria, died less than a monthafter giving birth to her second child on November 12, 1999.

Ms Heffey said Mrs Smeeton had suffered from severe postnatal depression after thebirth of her first child in 1996, and was prescribed dothiepin.

Shortly before the birth of her second child on October 14, 1999, Mrs Smeeton saw thesame psychiatrist, Dr Ian Douglas, with a view to averting another bout of depression.

She began taking the antidepressant five weeks before the birth and Dr Douglas supervisedan increase in the dose on her discharge from the Wangaratta District Hospital.

The court heard a 650mg dose of dothiepin is potentially lethal. Mrs Smeeton was ona 250mg daily dose when she died, but was largely in control of her own medication.

Her husband had told the court he had never been told of the drug's dangers and wasunaware it could kill.

No contribution of death was determined.

After today's finding, Mrs Smeeton's mother Pam Amsden, said it was important the coroner'srecommendations be adopted.

"We definitely want doctors to be a lot more aware of these women that are desperatelyin need of help," Ms Amsden told reporters.

"They may not know it, but people around them can see that things are not going well.

They get very disorientated.

"I don't think doctors take enough notice."

Ms Heffey also handed down the findings in relation to the death of Yvonne Carriggin bushland beside the River Edi in Northern Victoria on April 13, 2000.

Ms Carrigg had given birth to a son, Alex, on January 24 of that year. She had previouslygiven birth to two daughters.

She had been living in a happy and stable relationship at the time of her death, Ms Heffey said.

Ms Heffey cited a report which suggested postnatal depression was experienced by about14 per cent of women.

AAP db/jlw/sek/de

KEYWORD: SMEETON