Researching emotional care in paediatric patients: a public health issue

We share the process: a meeting, a literature review and three videos.

In the months leading up to COVID-19, the group of commissioners, was documenting everyday situations in which both patients and families are under emotional stress., in order to identify which are the most common. We were also looking for contacts with other professionals with whom we could organise a workshop to share experiences and compare methods.

During this meeting, which we are holding in February 2020, we recorded several interviews, with the group of commissioners and with the invited professionals, in order to have a wide range of voices and opinions. that can help us to reflect on emotional care in paediatric patients. 

Another of the objectives of the meeting was to present the literature review carried out by Sara Miguel Barrena, child and adolescent clinical psychologist and researcher of the project. We believe it will be very useful for those hospitals that do not have a psychological interconsultation service specialising in paediatrics or that want to delve deeper into theoretical and practical aspects of emotional care in paediatric patients.

The Encuentro served as an excuse to interview several of the people who attended and to produce several videos. In the first one, we had the voices of three of our principals who are part of the nursing staff of the Hospital Universitario Nuestra Señora de Candelaria involved in the project. In the video they tell about their day-to-day work and their personal vision of the importance of an emotional relationship with their patients.

In the second video we have the presence of Javier Padilla (Family Doctor and expert in Public Health, has recently published, together with Pedro Gullón, the book «.«Epidemiocracy: No one is safe if we are not all safe«), Elena González Rojo (Sociologist, expert in Public Health and Professor at the UPO) and Sara Miguel Barrena herself.

Finally we also recorded an interview with which I as project mediator by ZEMOS98 I explain the concomitance and the main challenges it faces.

All this happened before the state of alarm was decreed, before we were confined and before we experienced the most important health crisis of the last century, and now we are moving forward, but not before sharing a series of reflections as a point and a follow-up:

1.Our deep thanks from Concomitentes to Quique, Ruyman, Lili, Seve y Laura, The nursing staff involved in the project, who have been on the front line and helped to overcome a critical situation.

2.The crucial importance of emotional care and mental health as major public health issues in today's societies.

3.The relevance of a project targeting the child population that seeks to provide imaginative solutions to the challenges faced in a hostile context such as a paediatric ICU.

We hope that all this content will be useful to other people and professionals.

• "We cannot leave children alone, without emotional support" - Sara Miguel in the literature review.
• "All of us who work there know how to care: for the children, for the families and for each other. Ruyman Miranda, a nurse and project partner.
• "There is no health of the self without the health of the us". Interviews with Javier Padilla, Elena Rojo and Sara Miguel
• "Art that is produced behind the back of a social or political context is of no interest to us". Felipe G. Gil (ZEMOS98) on concomitance.