Psychoprophylaxis: What It Is And How It Helps Patients Before Surgery
Psychoprophylaxis is a method of psychological intervention aimed at all those people who must undergo surgery or are in the recovery process after having undergone the operation.
This intervention focuses its efforts on appropriately channeling the patient’s emotions and impulses that could have a level of direct impact on the operation process.
In this article we will see what psychoprophylaxis consists of, and its characteristics.
This therapeutic tool is based on employ multiple resources based on specific activities, depending on what the patient’s needs are. For example, applying psychoprophylaxis to a pregnant woman is not the same as applying psychoprophylaxis to a person who has had spinal surgery.
In this sense the activities must be different, but always focused on promoting coping, on reducing the psychological consequences of the operation and in accelerating the person’s biopsychosocial recovery.
As for the activities used, they are varied and depend on the patient’s reality and other factors, such as age and interest in these activities.
When it comes to children, recreational activities are usually used so that through the play process the therapist can influence the infant’s level of distress and relate the feeling of tranquility that playing produces with the surgical experience that he or she will have to face (or with the recovery process that he or she is going through).
In the case of adults, the techniques are more related to physical activities that can provide them with a state of flow sufficient to make the therapy have good results.
Psychoeducation is an important element of psychoprophylaxis, since the simple fact of having information helps people adopt lifestyle habits capable of promoting proper mental health.
Likewise, psychoeducation is used so that patients diagnosed with disorders know how to minimize the chances of relapse or adopting routines that lead to other disorders or physical illnesses (which may arise given their vulnerable situation). And also to inform the relatives of these patients, so that they create a context adapted to the patient.
How are patients helped?
Below we will see in detail the areas of influence of psychoprophylaxis
1. Coping with the operation
This area focuses on the cognitive part of the patient, and the resolution of people’s doubts and concerns, in addition to giving the possibility of expressing anguish in words and question irrational beliefs
2. Minimize the psychological consequences of the operation
What is sought here is to prevent the subject from being left with any psychological trauma due to the operation.
For example, sometimes it happens that after undergoing surgery post-traumatic stress appears, due to which the subject generates an irrational fear of everything related to medical procedures or health centers.
This can be achieved through the maieutics used by the therapist during activities with the patient. It involves identifying and modifying the subject’s catastrophic thoughts in order to replace them with more adaptive ones.
Taking into account that a surgical procedure can interfere in various aspects of a person’s life, not only organically, but also socially and psychologically, psychoprophylaxis is responsible for recovering the person in each of these areas
From the physical activities used in this form of intervention, the physical part that contributes to organic recovery is worked on, and at the same time a significant social interaction is proposed, which helps the subject gain confidence to face their situation with a more optimistic and adaptive attitude.
What are the variants of this technique?
Depending on the case, there will be some variations in this therapeutic method, as we have seen previously, facing childbirth is not the same as facing spinal surgery.
Thus, depending on the surgical process to which the subject must undergo, there must be certain adaptations. Let’s go see them.
1. The integration of the medical team
This implies involve medical staff members that are related to the operation in at least one of the therapeutic sessions, so that the patient feels more confident with the process and reduces their anxiety level.
2. Psychoeducation regarding the operation
During this process, the therapist is responsible for providing the patient with specific information about the process to which they must undergo, or to which they have been subjected. Always from a positive approach, with a view to restoring the subject’s quality of life.
3. Work with family
In some cases it is good to involve the family in therapy especially in cases where one or more family members play the role of caregiver.
This is not only positive for the patient but also for the family members, who could have a high level of stress and anxiety as a result of their work caring for the subject.
