Répercussions du diagnostic périnatal de malformation sur l'Enfant et ses parents: Approche métapsychologique à partir de l'Étude longitudinale de 30 familles

Abstract

Thirty families were given therapy for 15 months after a perinatal diagnosis of malformation in their child. Six interview sessions were proposed to the parents in order to study the immediate repercussions of the diagnosis, their psychic organisation and their engagement in the parenting process. The evaluation of the child was carried out using two tests by Brazelton at birth and there were direct observations in the home during the third, eighth and fifteenth months of age. The intensity of the first manifestations of anxiety and disorganisation were not predictive of the parents' psychic rearrangement nor were they predicative of the child's organisation or the quality of the mother/infant relationship. The somato-psychic organization of the child was independant of the severity of his malformation as well as the ordinary psychic functioning of his parents at three months, but was significantly correlated to it at 8 to 15 months. The analysis of the impact of this research on the parents made it possible to clarify the place of the psychotherapist in the maternity ward.