Nursing care plan for dealing with perinatal bereavement according to the theory of dysfunctional bereavement....

We present the clinical case report on a 33-year-old woman who, after a perinatal death, presented a complicated grieving process. The aim was to apply an individualised care plan that enabled reestablishment of the woman's emotional balance and environment after an experience of perinatal death. During the first visit to her midwife, the Athens Insomnia, Continuity Bonds and Goldberg Anxiety and Depression scales were applied. Focussed assessment was made using the Gordon patterns and based on the nursing approach described in the Dysfunctional Bereavement Theory. Six International NANDA diagnostic labels were identified (maladaptative grieving, insomnia, hopelessness, ineffective mothering process, moral distress and anxiety), and these were prioritised using clinical network reasoning, using the Outcome Present State Test (OPT) model, observing the relationships between the labels, diagnoses and identifying how they affected the rest. For each International NANDA diagnostic labels, the nursing outcomes were planned, along with the planned nursing interventions. The expected results included the description of the evaluation indicators using the Likert scales. Both results and interventions were agreed between the professional and the mother. The care plan raises the difficulty that nursing professionals face when attending to situations of complicated grief, and specifically, those associated with perinatal death. This situation makes key competencies necessary in training, as well as the need to find out about new nursing approaches.