Professional Articles

Psychosocial responses of parents to their infant’s diagnosis of hypoplastic left heart syndrome

All parents of the infants diagnosed with hypoplastic left heart syndrome experienced intense loss and stressors. Physicians need to be sensitive to the needs and thinking of the parents when discussing treatment options before surgery. The nature of the relationship with the doctor at this time can support parents or be a further source of stress.

Parenting a child at home with hypoplastic left heart syndrome: experiences of commitment, of stress, and of love

The parents’ experience in supporting a child with hypoplastic left heart syndrome is one of stress, of commitment, and of love. Although parents experienced joy in their child, they were also subjected to anxiety with four parents test positive to post-traumatic stress disorder and hypervigilance while monitoring their child’s condition. Parents lived with many difficulties, and demands.

Psychosocial Experiences of Parents of Infants
With Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome in the PICU

All parents of surviving infants with hypoplastic left heart syndrome in PICU, irrespective of timing of diagnosis, experienced numerous stresses and losses, and the majority exhibited clinical levels of traumatic stress. Receiving the diagnosis itself is very traumatic and is compounded by the environment of the PICU which alienates parents from their infants and interferes with parent-infant bonding.

Death of Infants and Children With Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome

The management of children with congenital heart disease has radically changed. Children who were previously deemed inoperable can now receive satisfactory correction or palliation (1,2). One of the most serious malformations is hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS).

“Power and Prejudice”:
Thinking Differently About Grief

This article explores some of the challenges we face as educators and practitioners in thinking and teaching about, and responding to, grief. Questioning the capacity of prevailing theoretical perspectives on grief to adequately capture the complexity and diversity of people’s grief experiences, we consider the power and prejudices we potentially bring to our work.

Is This Person Suffering Grief or Trauma or Traumatic Grief?

Traumatic Grief is a phenomenon talked about in the grief field. Over the years there has been extensive literature on loss and bereavement. The literature of trauma and its impact is still new. As with bereavement, where there has been an emphasis on a person suffering from trauma, it has usually been viewed as a single entity.

Grief and coping of parents whose child has a constant life-threatening disability, hypoplastic left heart syndrome with reference to the Dual-Process Model

This paper reports on a study that examined the grief and coping of 29 parents whose child has hypoplastic left heart syndrome using the Dual Process Model. The study employed a secondary thematic analysis of interviews at key times of treatment and recovery for the child. After the diagnosis, parents experienced intense loss (LO), but focused upon restoration-orientated tasks (RO) to support their child. Over time, most parents employed a healthy oscillation between LO coping and RO coping, with waves of grief and with some grieving suppressed. There are some specific grief and coping and gender patterns employed by parents.