by InTrieste
The “Psychological Support from Prenatal Diagnosis” project, conceived by A.B.C. Association for Surgical Children of Burlo in partnership with the IRCCS Burlo Garofolo, was created to provide psychological support from the first ultrasound to parents of children with malformations for which surgical therapy is envisaged. Now in its fifth year of activity (the second year of the second three-year period is now underway), the project continues to grow also thanks to the feedback from families: between September 2022 and May 2023, parents responded to some qualitative questionnaires and quantitative, the result of recent systematic research, conducted for a university thesis.
The Project
The “Psychological Support from Prenatal Diagnosis” project is, together with the Hospitality project, one of the cornerstones of A.B.C. and has proved essential since the foundation of the Association: it was born, in fact, from the awareness that the communication of a diagnosis of malformation affecting the unborn child in the prenatal phase is a traumatic event and is the prelude to a long process of treatment, in which the family faces significant suffering, sharing the journey with different professionals and hospital departments.
The presence of a specialized psychologist alongside families from the first moments of pregnancy is, therefore, an activity that the Association has always proposed and which has grown over the years, confirming itself as an important response to an urgent and fundamental need for future parents. 2018 saw the happy evolution that – thanks to a project that brought together the IRCCS Burlo Garofolo and A.B.C. – led to this professional figure, identified in the therapist supported by A.B.C., being supported by the hospital staff in a structured way.
Psychological support, thanks to this agreement, is therefore an integral part of the entire treatment process; the aim of the project is that the presence of the psychologist, immediately next to the parents, can support them in the initial process of accepting reality and in preventing future discomfort caused by an unprocessed trauma, which can also be caused by a possible bereavement in the prenatal period; this allows you to create a climate of mutual trust that allows you to face the most painful anxieties and experiences. At the same time, the professional’s task is to support the hospital professionals, to encourage the therapeutic alliance between doctor and patient and thus contribute to facilitating the surgical and treatment path, improving communication of the diagnosis between hospital operators and the family.
Furthermore, the project promotes transversal accompaniment across the departments and the different phases, making it easier for the family to use the hospital service. The response method to families is shared within the hospital through coordination between the different professionals and the various services that provide psychological support to patients. The figure of the psychotherapist therefore works in an integrated way with the medical staff, involving – in addition to the complex structure of Surgery and all its clinics and Fetal Medicine and Prenatal Diagnostics, the Delivery Room, the Obstetrics and Gynecology Clinic, Neonatology and Intensive Care Neonatal, the complex Anesthesia and Resuscitation structure and the Pediatric Clinic.
The support program for families also has the great property of being flexible and adapting to the needs of different moments (before, during and after childbirth) and different situations, families and children. During gestation the psychotherapist attends the ultrasound and future exams, remains alongside the parents during surgical counseling and meets the future mother. If requested by the family, he assists at the cesarean section and after the birth continues with meetings in the ward in addition to those dedicated to parents only. After discharge, the families have further interviews available, the psychotherapist is present at subsequent hospital checks and meets the parents during any further hospitalizations of the children.
