About the Reproductive Mental Health Service:
IWK Health’s Reproductive Mental Health Service (RMHS) provides care for those experiencing mental health challenges during pregnancy and after birth.
Our team includes doctors, nurses, and clinical therapists who work together to provide understanding, respectful, and personalized care.
For patients, we offer individual and group psychotherapy and medication consultation and/or management.
We also offer phone consultations to prescribers regarding the use of psychiatric medications in pregnancy and breastfeeding.
We are not an emergency service. If you are experiencing a mental health crisis, call the Provincial Mental Health and Addictions Crisis Line at 1-888-429-8167 or visit your nearest emergency department.
For additional perinatal mental health resources, click here.
Who we help
We provide specialized outpatient mental health services to birthing parents who are pregnant/postpartum and are currently experiencing moderate to severe psychiatric symptoms with significant impairment related to perinatal issues.
If your concern is primarily related to perinatal grief and loss, please visit our Pregnancy Loss webpage for available services and support.
Referrals are accepted from providers for clients living in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick or Prince Edward Island.
People can be referred to RMHS after 12 weeks of pregnancy, and up to 9 months after giving birth.
For people already connected to mental health support, RMHS does not replace this care; we recommend patients continue with their current mental health treatment. However, in some situations, we offer consultation to community and other specialty mental health providers regarding perinatal-specific issues.
RMHS is not intended to provide primary mental health treatment for long-term illness/difficulties unrelated to perinatal issues.
We offer pre-conception consultation to prescribers (usually via phone consultation with the prescriber) for people on psychiatric medications who are planning to conceive. For some particularly complex cases, we may meet directly with the person planning to conceive.
Accessing this Clinic, Program or Service
People can be referred to for our support by their family doctor, obstetrician, midwife, nurse practitioner, attending physician, or by an IWK or NSHA clinical therapist. We do not accept self-referrals.
Please complete the referral form linked on the righthand side of the page and fax to 902-470-6760 or email to rmhs@iwk.nshealth.ca.
If referring providers have questions about the referral process or our intake criteria, please don’t hesitate to contact us at 902-470-8098 and ask to speak with the intake coordinator, or send an e-mail with your question to rmhs@iwk.nshealth.ca.