Comparative Effectiveness of Non-Pharmacological Interventions for Postpartum Depression and Anxiety: A Network Meta-Analysis

Zhu Y, Yang W, Li N, Yang J, Yang J, Zheng Y, Chen W, Yang Y, Liu Y, Zhao Y · Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment · 2025 December

DOI 10.2147/NDT.S549504

Objective

To investigate the comparative efficacy of non-pharmacological interventions, including acupuncture, exercise, psychotherapy, exercise combined with psychotherapy, and music therapy, in alleviating postpartum depression symptoms.

Conclusions

The study concludes that non-pharmacological interventions, especially exercise combined with psychotherapy, acupuncture, and exercise alone, show promise in improving symptoms of postpartum depression, with exercise combined with psychotherapy being the most effective.

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Insights

Exercise combined with psychotherapy, acupuncture, and exercise alone can effectively alleviate symptoms of postpartum depression and anxiety.

Scientific databases such as the Cochrane Library, Web of Science, EMBASE, PubMed, Scopus, CNKI, VIP Database, and Wanfang Database were used to locate randomized controlled trials up to September 1, 2024. The interventions compared were acupuncture, exercise, psychotherapy, exercise combined with psychotherapy, and music therapy. The primary focus was on depression and the secondary on anxiety, with the risk of bias assessed using the Cochrane RoB2. Results were evaluated from 35 trials involving 4047 participants. Non-pharmacological interventions resulted in significant improvements in depressive symptoms when compared to a control group, showing particular effectiveness for the intervention of exercise combined with psychotherapy, followed by acupuncture and then exercise alone. Similar results were observed for anxiety symptoms with the same order of efficacy. These results position exercise combined with psychotherapy as a potentially highly effective initial intervention for mild to moderate cases of postpartum depression.