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Psychologically well-prepared children adapt to the treatment process more easily, both the operation and the postoperative period are much more comfortable. Therefore, it is very important to prepare the child psychologically for the operation, and parents have a great responsibility in this matter. You may find yourself inadequate in this regard, but after carefully reading and understanding the information provided below, you will see that it is not as difficult as you think.
Having a child undergo a surgery is usually a scary situation for most families. Most of this fear comes from a lack of knowledge and the additional stress that comes with the fact that the patient is a child. Although surgical procedures are to be performed by a team of experts, it is entirely out of parents control and thus a serious source of concern for the parents whose children will undergo surgery. In this section, which has been prepared to help relieve your worries and fears about ear reconstruction, you can find some tips to help for phychological preperation of the parents and children for surgery.
Surgery, whether major or minor, causes anxiety in everyone. Knowing what will happen before and after the surgery significantly reduces the anxiety experienced by the patient and their relatives.
It is very important that you talk with your child properly about microtia and the surgery to be performed. To motivate your child in a positive way, you can talk about how they will look great with their new ear, that they can wear any glasses, earrings or headphones they want; you can show the photos of happy children who have already had ear reconstruction. It will be quite helpful in preoperative preperation of the kids to meet the doctor who will perform the surgery and his team at least a few months before the surgery, and hearing pleasant stories about the doctor from you.
As parents, your role in preparing the children for surgery and during the postoperative period in which they will stay in the hospital is crucial. However, if you are not well prepared for this, you will not be able to help either your child or our team. Therefore, the first step of a childs psychological preparation before an ear reconstruction should be preparing the parents themselves.
Children receive most of their emotional cues from adults. They easily perceive your stress, anxiety and fear and match these feelings. In short, childrens behavior is often shaped by observing those around them, especially their parents. If you show anxiety and fear, it is inevitable that your child will model this behavior. In other words, they will be scared and worried the same way you are. If you can stay calm and brave, the child is more likely to do the same. Therefore, as a parent, you must first set your own fears and worries aside in order to be able to help your child and the team that undertakes your childs treatment. Well, how are you going to do that?
As humans, our fears and worries often come from the unknown; so, as a parent, all you have to do to keep your fears and worries about the life of your child under control is to equip yourself with knowledge. Find out as much as possible about your childs condition and treatment of microtia, as well as about what will happen before, during and after surgery, and what the healing process will be like. As DR. MUTAF INTERNATIONAL MICROTIA CLINIC team, we are happy to answer all your questions about the surgery. Because we know well that knowledge overcomes fear, and the more knowledge you have, the easier it will be for you to put aside your fears. You will see that your fears and worries will decrease, and you will relax as you learn.
If you feel psychologically ready after you have been sufficiently informed about the surgery and treatment your child will undergo, you can now proceed to the stage of explaining the process to your child. Take the time to explain the details of the process to your child in a way they can understand.
All children, except babies, should be at least told that they will go to the hospital to undergo a surgery. Parents should also give some basic information about how it will be to be in the hospital and when they will return home.
The things you should do and say to prepare your child for the surgery will depend on their age and how much they can understand. However, there are three general strategies that parents can use to help their children: figure out the right tone; be calm, and be honest. Before making any explanations to your child, let your child ask questions, express their concerns, if any, and what is in their mind with their own words by asking your child what they know, what they are curious and whether they have any questions about ear construction. Thus, before you begin your speech, you can learn your childs thoughts on this issue, whether positive or negative, and you can start by answering questions or correcting misleading information that create fear and worry in your child.
You can say that it is easier said than done, and you will be right. Indeed, this is not always easy, especially if your child says, "I dont want it! Im afraid. Will it hurt?" So, what do we say, and how do we explain it?
First of all, being honest shouldnt mean being scary. Instead of informing them directly, you can use the storytelling method to explain the surgery to your child. In doing so, it is important that you choose your words carefully. Because children often interpret words with their initial meaning. Over the years, we have developed a special language to comfort pediatric patients in our clinic. We use phrases that will not scare children, for example: instead of "opening a vein" we will put a butterfly, instead of "removing stitches" we will clean the blue threads, or instead of “wound care" we will put cream on the new ear, etc. With a similar approach, it is very important that you create more pleasant words instead of words such as needle, wound, blood, cut, stitch that will cause fear in the child. You can create better words based on the character and age of your child, but this short text, which we have created in the light of our experience, can help or at least inspire you to tell your child about the hospital stay without scaring him.
When we go to the hospital, they will first give us a very nice room where we can stay with you. Then we will meet the nurse sisters. They will stick something called a “BUTTERFLY” on your hand or arm.
Will it hurt?Hmmm, its very little, you know, you were vaccinated and thats it, or you can pretend to pinch him and make him laugh and say thats it. You can also describe it by comparing it to an experience he had before that hurt a little… for example, “a little fly bit him”, but it wont hurt at all else.
What Then?Then we will all go to the floor where they will make big ears for you, uncle doctor will be waiting for you there. There is water inside that butterfly that will make you magically sleep. You will fall asleep sweetly. When you wake up you will see your new ear. Thats all. Then we will come back to our room together. The next day you will be able to eat ice cream, cake, whatever you want.
How long will we stay there?We will come to our hotel after 3 - 4 days and our BODRUM holiday will begin :)
While applying the storytelling method to inform your child about the ear reconstruction procedure, you can be much more creative; you can develop different expressions according to your childs age and character. However, it is very important that you focus on the expressions that you SHOULD NOT use more than the words that you should use while doing this, because you can negatively affect the child with a wrong statement that you will set up. For this purpose, you can use the table below, where we have sampled the true and false statements from the point of view of child psychology.
Especially when entering the operating room, sentences such as "dont be afraid, we are here" have the opposite effect, causing fear and anxiety to be etched into the childs mind. On the contrary, you should make sentences that will make your child eager for ear reconstruction. For example, just say, "ITs GOING TO BE GREAT." To encourage your kid more, you can promise for something, that you know he/she wants very much, after the ear reconstruction. However, you should fulfill these promises that you made before the operation to avoid a trust problem between you and your child.
What we want from you parents is, in a nutshell, a positive and supportive approach that will allow your children to come our clinic free of fears and worries
