NICU Families and PTSD, Article Review Example

Neonatal intensive care unit is a very sensitive unit because it specializes in infants that are up to about a month old. Due to the sensitivity involved, the area calls for a person who has a desire to protect the infants. The families of the infants have also been seen to be as vulnerable as the NICU patients. This vulnerability has been described as PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder which commonly comes as an underlying issue causing emotional reaction due to the patients stay in the unit.

Patients with PTSD can easily be recognized if they have these symptoms: re-experiences, arousal increase that could cause concentration difficulties, and persistence avoidance. Families of NICU patients develop PTSD after childbirth due to several factors. These factors may include premature delivery, emergency or operative delivery, the few days experience as a parent of an infant in NICU, poor delivery timing and emergency cesarean section.

The first thing that nurses should do so as to help patients facing NICU experience is to be aware of their distress. The easiest yet very effective strategy is listening. Listening to these parents has proven to be very therapeutic. Mothers seek empathy and the best way to offer this is by listening to them. Every couple should also be treated uniquely and the nurse should take it as a duty to determine the couple’s perception so as to know the kind of support they need.

It is also essential to de-brief mothers after a traumatic birth. Nurses should therefore have strategies at hand whenever there are cases such as premature and/or emergency delivery, operative birth and parenting an infant in the NICU. There should be counseling sessions for these parents and empathy should be key when dealing with them.