Psychiatric aspects of spontaneous abortion. I. A matched control study of women with living children

The Silent Sympathy: A Study of Attitudes toward Spontaneous Abortion

A study of 560 health professionals and students indicated widespread sympathy for miscarriage patients: 83 per cent of respondents rated the emotional support needs of miscarriage patients above the average rating they provided for seventeen other medical conditions. Interestingly, those involved in the delivery of health care were less likely than those not involved to rate emotional support needs of miscarriage patients higher than average. The need to provide strong emotional support systems for these women and training for health care professionals is stressed.

International comparison of studies using the perinatal grief scale: a decade of research on pregnancy loss

The Perinatal Grief Scale (PGS) has been used in many studies of loss in pregnancy, including miscarriage, stillbirth, induced abortion, neonatal death, and relinquishment for adoption. This article describes 22 studies from 4 countries that used the PGS with a total of 2485 participants. Studies that report Cronbach's alpha for their own samples give evidence of very high internal consistency reliability. Evidence for the validity of the PGS is also reviewed, such as convergent validity seen in its association with measures of mental health, social support, and marital satisfaction. The standard errors of the means for the total scale and for the subscales reveal fairly consistent scores, in spite of very different samples and types of loss; computation of means and standard deviations for the studies as a whole permits us to establish normal score ranges. Significantly higher scores were found in studies that recruited participants from support groups and self-selected populations rather than from medical sources, and from U.S. studies compared with those in Europe.

Research-based practice with women who have had miscarriages

PURPOSE

To summarize a research-based description of what it is like to miscarry and to recommend an empirically tested theory of caring for women who have experienced miscarriage.

DESIGN

The research program included three phases: interpretive theory generation, descriptive survey and instrument development, and experimental testing of a theory-based intervention.

METHODS

Research methods included interpretive phenomenology, factor analysis, and ANCOVA.

FINDINGS

A theory of caring and a model of what it is like to miscarry were generated, refined, and tested. A case study shows one woman's response to miscarrying and illustrates clinical application of the caring theory.

CONCLUSIONS

The Miscarriage Model is a useful framework for anticipating the variety of responses women have to miscarrying. The caring theory is an effective and sensitive guide to clinical practice with women who miscarry.

Effects of caring, measurement, and time on miscarriage impact and women's well-being

BACKGROUND

Responses to miscarriage range from relief to devastation, yet there have been no randomized controlled studies that demonstrate significant effects of counseling with women who miscarry.

OBJECTIVE

To test the effects of caring-based counseling, measurement, and time on the integration of loss (miscarriage impact) and women's emotional well-being (moods and self-esteem) in the first year after miscarrying.

METHOD

ANCOVA was used in this randomized, longitudinal Solomon four-group experimental investigation. Enrolled were 242; 185 completed. Outcomes included: self-esteem, overall emotional disturbance, anger, depression, anxiety, confusion, overall miscarriage impact, personal significance, devastating event, lost baby, and isolated.

RESULTS

During the first year after loss (a) caring was effective in reducing overall emotional disturbance, anger, and depression; and (b) time passing led to increased self-esteem and decreased anxiety, depression, anger, confusion, and personal significance of loss.

CONCLUSION

Caring, measurement, and time had some positive and significant effects on the integration of loss and enhancement of well-being in the first year subsequent to miscarrying.

Motherhood and childlessness in monozygous twins. I. Early relationships

Gross somatic illnesses and psychotic reactions associated with pregnancy, parturition and the puerperium are well known, but it is only in recent years that attention has been paid in any systematic way to milder neurotic reactions post partum. During the last decade reports have appeared from several centres on woman's reactions to pregnancy, studied from various viewpoints. As regards psychological reactions it is obvious that the modern Western woman has to a considerable extent an ambivalent attitude to maternity. It is therefore hardly surprising if this attitude, together with the sometimes pronounced somatic strain of pregnancy, results in a high frequency of emotional disturbances during and after pregnancy.