Overlapping blood extracellular vesicle mRNA profiles in anxious and euthymic pregnant women who develop postpartum...

A significant number of women who develop postpartum depression (PPD) experience anxiety and other psychiatric complications during pregnancy. In our previous study, we discovered that blood extracellular vesicle (EV) mRNA levels were altered in euthymic pregnant women who went on to develop PPD. In order to replicate our findings and determine the effects of perinatal anxiety on blood EV mRNA levels, we compared longitudinally collected blood samples at seven time points in 18 women recruited for a perinatal anxiety study, half of whom went on to develop PPD. We discovered 491 maternal blood EV mRNA changes that associated with PPD. One hundred fourteen of these EV mRNA differences were identical to the differences we identified in non-depressed pregnant women who went on to develop PPD, an overlap much higher than expected by chance. Gene set enrichment analysis revealed that EV mRNA levels associated with mitochondrial functions were elevated in both cohorts. Our results replicate our previous findings and suggest that disruptions in EV mRNA communication during pregnancy may be central to the pathology of PPD.