A perinatal clinic psychologist’s experience in a hospital maternity ward

The clinical practice carried out at the Perinatal Clinical Psychology Department of the Obstetrics and Gynecology Division of Hospital “V. Buzzi” will be described here. The Department provides both psychopathology prevention and psychotherapeutic services (preparatory birth and puerperium courses, psychological care in wards, out-patients’ psychotherapy, Perinatal Diagnosis psychological care, psychological training for perinatal health care professionals, research work, etc.). Perinatal therapies in hospital require a very intense emotional exchange and a technique capable of tackling very acute or emergency situations. Perinatal psychologists have to be flexible in adjusting the classical therapeutic setting. Instead of working in their offices they are asked to have a dialogue with women at their bedsides or in front of their infants’ incubators; they must be able to facilitate and follow rapid changes, alternate psychological listening to simply providing information, have an exchange - alone - with the woman or the father-to-be, or else intervene in the marital dyad or in the mother-infant interaction when the infant requires breast-feeding or changing nappies during the session.

Keywords: Perinatal clinical psychology, psychic motherhood, parenting preparatory work.

Monica Grigio, L’esperienza di psicologia clinica perinatale in una maternità ospedaliera in "INTERAZIONI" 1/2012, pp 100-118, DOI: 10.3280/INT2012-001008