The importance of psychological preparation
by Verena del Valle
The importance of psychological preparation
by Verena del Valle
Psicóloga certificada Child Life
Mom but also certified Child Life specialist. Verena is a trained professional with expertise in helping children and their families overcome life’s most challenging events, particularly those related to healthcare and hospitalization.
La preparación psicológica de los niños es muy importante en todos los ámbitos de la vida, pero especialmente en el ámbito médico. De la misma forma que preparamos a nuestros hijos cuando les enseñamos a nadar, tenemos que prepararlos también para una visita al hospital.
– We’ll avoid saying, “Once you’re asleep, they’ll give you a little prick.”
– Instead, we can say, “When you will be in the recovery room, you will see a catheter in your hand/arm, it’s a little plastic tube that allows the doctors to give you medicine when you need it.
En las siguientes cápsulas exploraremos paso a paso cómo hacer una preparación adecuada a la edad de nuestro hijo/a para que la visita al hospital deje de ser un problema para toda la familia y pase a convertirse en una aventura apasionante.
– “First we will wait in the waiting room until they come to pick us up to put on your operating room clothes” (In case the word “pyjamas” is used, it is important to clarify whether we are going to sleep in the hospital or not. Wearing “pajamas” may make the child think that he or she has to spend the night in the hospital).
– (It is important to include in the explanation details such as: Can the Teddy bear come with you? Will mom or dad be able to accompany you inside? If you do not know the answer to these questions it is better to find out the usual hospital protocol first).
– “Doctors and children must wear green to enter the operating room. The children wear very clean hospital clothes, and the nurses and doctors wear special clothes. In the operating room, the clothes are green or blue…“
– “Doctors usually wear a mask and a cap to keep their hair up. The mask prevents them from having to put their hand in their mouth when they have to cough, for example, and the cap prevents hair from bothering them on their face while they work and also because they can’t drop hair on the floor, which would make the operating room dirty.”
– “It’s usually chilly in the operating room, so the germs don’t want to get in!”
– “The doctor will bring a mask to your face that will cover your mouth and nose, and your job will be to breathe into the mask.”“
– “The anesthesia has a taste you’ve never tasted before, will you tell me later what it tasted like?” “The medicine that will make you sleep is called anesthesia, and it has a smell you’ve probably never felt, or maybe you have…!, will you tell me later what it tasted like?” Some kids say it smells like paint (Anesthesia is usually given by mask for children up to 12 years old)
