did a study find 53% of women with postpartum psychosis have delusions about the infant?
“Chandra, at all saying that the majority of women with postpartum psychosis, 53% have delusional ideas that are related to the infant specifically.”
a host, a psychiatrist said on Psychiatry & Psychotherapy Podcast, 2026-09-26, at 54:13. hear it in context → the speaker cited: Chandra et al..
the episode: Postpartum Psychosis: Symptoms, Diagnosis, Treatment, and Prevention with Dr. Margaret Spinelli (at 54:13). we link the show's own page; we do not re-host audio.
first, the part that holds
the number is real and the attribution is right: a 2006 study by Chandra and colleagues reported that 53% of 108 women hospitalized with severe mental illness beginning after childbirth had delusions related to the infant.
what we found when we went and looked
we pulled the abstract of the paper the speaker named (Chandra PS, Bhargavaraman RP, Raghunandan VN, Shaligram D, Archives of Women's Mental Health, 2006). it assessed 108 consecutive women admitted to an inpatient psychiatric unit in south india over two years with severe mental illness that began in the postpartum period, using the Kannada version of the Birmingham Interview for Maternal Mental Health. its own words: "Fifty-three percent of subjects reported delusions related to the infant, with 34% reporting more than one delusion." the 53% figure, the author and the infant-specific content all match. the one stretch is scope: this is one inpatient sample from one hospital, so "the majority of women with postpartum psychosis" is that sample's finding, not a settled rate for everyone with the condition.
assertion by assertion
| assertion | verdict | what the record says |
|---|---|---|
| a study by Chandra et al. examined delusions related to the infant in women with postpartum psychosis | confirmed | the paper is titled "Delusions related to infant and their association with mother-infant interactions in postpartum psychotic disorders" (Archives of Women's Mental Health 2006;9(5):285-8), first author Chandra. the sample is described as women with "onset of severe mental illness in the postpartum", and the title frames them as postpartum psychotic disorders. the abstract does not break the sample down by diagnosis. [1] |
| 53% of the women had delusional ideas related to the infant | confirmed | abstract: "Fifty-three percent of subjects reported delusions related to the infant, with 34% reporting more than one delusion." the denominator is 108 consecutive inpatients at one unit in south india, assessed with a structured maternal mental health interview. [1] |
| this means the majority of women with postpartum psychosis in general have infant-related delusions | unverifiable | 53% is a bare majority from one hospital-admitted sample in one region. women with milder illness or care outside a hospital were not studied, and the sample is defined as severe postpartum-onset mental illness rather than one confirmed diagnosis. the abstract cannot tell us the rate across all postpartum psychosis. [1] |
| infant-related delusions matter clinically for the mother-infant relationship | confirmed | in the same study, mothers with infant-related delusions had more significant abusive incidents and were more often judged unsafe to look after the baby alone. those with persecutory delusions about the infant were more likely to be affectionate and to provide normal basic care. an earlier prospective study from the same group (50 inpatients, J Nerv Ment Dis 2002) found that psychotic ideas toward the infant predicted infanticidal behavior. [1][2] |
both directions
for the speaker: the primary abstract states the 53% figure word for word, and it is specifically about delusions related to the infant. the attribution to Chandra and colleagues is correct. the study used a structured interview on consecutive admissions rather than chart review, which lowers the risk of cherry-picking cases. an earlier study by the same group points the same way: psychotic ideas about the infant were a key predictor of infanticidal behavior.
against: the 53% describes one sample: 108 women admitted to a single inpatient unit in south india. the speaker's wording, "the majority of women with postpartum psychosis", reads like a general rate. 53% is barely a majority, and hospitalized patients are likely the most severely ill. the abstract describes the sample as postpartum-onset severe mental illness and gives no diagnostic breakdown, so not every woman counted may have met criteria for postpartum psychosis in the narrow sense. "delusions related to the infant" covers a wide range, from persecutory fears for the baby's safety to beliefs that the baby is someone else's or a devil. the study found these have different links to how the mother treats the baby, so a single 53% figure hides real differences.
what this cannot say
we read the abstracts, not the full texts. the full paper sits behind a publisher login, so we could not check the diagnostic mix, the confidence interval or how the interview items were scored. we did not run a systematic search for other studies of delusion content in postpartum psychosis, so we cannot say whether 53% is typical, high or low across samples. the findings come from one region and one decade (data collected before 2006) and may not carry over to other settings.
sources, each one fetched and read
- Chandra PS, Bhargavaraman RP, Raghunandan VN, Shaligram D. Delusions related to infant and their association with mother-infant interactions in postpartum psychotic disorders. Arch Womens Ment Health. 2006;9(5):285-8. doi:10.1007/s00737-006-0147-7. PMID 16937315 (PubMed record via NCBI E-utilities) What we read there: 108 consecutive women with onset of severe mental illness in the postpartum, admitted to an inpatient psychiatric unit in South India over two years, assessed with the Kannada version of the Birmingham Interview for Maternal Mental Health. "Fifty-three percent of subjects reported delusions related to the infant, with 34% reporting more than one delusion." Mothers with infant-related delusions had more significant abusive incidents and were more likely to be considered unsafe looking after the baby alone. Fetched 2026-10-16 (HTTP 203). https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16937315/
- Chandra PS, Venkatasubramanian G, Thomas T. Infanticidal ideas and infanticidal behavior in Indian women with severe postpartum psychiatric disorders. J Nerv Ment Dis. 2002;190(7):457-61. doi:10.1097/00005053-200207000-00006. PMID 12142847 (PubMed record via NCBI E-utilities) What we read there: prospective study of 50 Indian women hospitalized for severe postpartum mental illness: 43% reported infanticidal ideas, 36% infanticidal behavior, 34% both. psychotic ideas toward the infant predicted infanticidal behavior. Fetched 2026-10-16 (HTTP 203). https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12142847/
speakers are described by role, not named. one sentence is quoted under fair use, with attribution and a link to the original at the timestamp; we do not re-host audio or video. nothing on this page is a reason to start, stop or change a medication. if you have the file behind anything marked unverifiable, the research board is where people can answer. adam