The NICU during COVID-19 Pandemic: Impact on Maternal Pediatric Medical Traumatic Stress (PMTS).

The objective of this paper was to assess how hospital and outpatient clinic policies changes due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic impact pediatric medical traumatic stress (PMTS) symptoms in mothers of newborns admitted in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Observational case-control study included the comparison between mothers of infants admitted in the NICU at birth during the COVID-19 pandemic and mothers of infants admitted in the NICU before the COVID-19 pandemic. The control group was selected matching 1:1 with the study group for the following infants' clinical variables: gender, type of pathology, gestational age, weight at birth, day of recovery, ventilator time days, and associated malformations. The Italian version of the Impact of Event Scale-Revised (IES-R) was used as a measure of PMTS. Mothers of the study group (50) scored significantly higher than mothers of the control group on three of four scales of IES-R ("IES-R total": The COVID-19 pandemic acted as superimposed stress in mothers of newborns admitted in the NICU at birth determining high levels of PMTS. Clinicians and researchers should identify and implement novel strategies to provide family-centered care during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. · COVID-19 acted as superimposed stress on NICU population.. · PMTS in mothers got significantly worse during the COVID-19 pandemic.. · Alert on long-term consequences on child development..

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Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts

None declared.