MORE must be done to improve the provision of perinatal mental health services for women in Wales, the Royal College of Midwives has warned.

Perinatal is the period immediately before and after birth, and a new map showing the spread of such services based on a level of 0-5, indicates that only two health board areas out of seven in Wales have them at levels four and five.

The map from the Maternal Mental Health Alliance (MMHA) indicates that pregnant women and new mums in a quarter of the UK still cannot access specialist perinatal mental health services which meet national guidelines.

In Wales, the Cardiff & Vale University Health Board (UHB) area has level five services and the Aneurin Bevan UHB area has level four services.

“While the latest maps indicate Wales is doing better than other areas in the UK such a Scotland and Northern Ireland, there is much more that needs to be done to improve the provision of vital perinatal mental health services for women in Wales," said Helen Rogers, RCM director for Wales.

“In October 2017 the children’s, young people and education committee in Wales published a report on perinatal mental health and some of the key recommendations were based on evidence provided by the RCM.

“While progress is being made, our concerns do remain on the absence of a mother and baby unit in Wales which is vital for families and means women are not separated from their babies, but these units are even more important for single mothers facing mental health problems alone with little or no support for family members.

“The RCM will also continue to advocate for a specialist perinatal mental health midwife to be placed in each health board with maternity services, as this is something instrumental to identifying pregnant women who need care and support and will also allow those mothers to be cared for within a community setting or at a hospital close to their home which will enable them to be supported by their families too.”

The MMHA welcomed the "encouraging" signs of progress seen across the UK but warns that there is not progress for all parts of the UK at the same rate, meaning there is a postcode lottery for women and families.

“Over ten years ago national guidelines said that specialist perinatal mental health services should be available for all women who need them. This still hasn't happened," said MMHA chairman Dr Alain Gregoire.

"We want to celebrate the new perinatal services that have been set up, but these maps show that there is still an urgent need for change on the ground.

"For women and families to be able to access specialist services, we need to see funding across all four nations of the UK. The job is not yet done. We need to turn the map green."

The Welsh Government says it is committed to improving maternal mental health services, and invested £1.5 million a year since 2015 in community perinatal mental health teams across Wales.