Psychological Preparation for Surgeries and Invasive Procedures

Surgeries, as well as diagnostic or therapeutic invasive procedures (such as colonoscopies, catheter insertions, etc.), and even non-invasive procedures (like X-rays), can have a profound psychological impact. These events involve the exploration or intrusion of the body, which each individual experiences differently depending on their personality, the meaning they assign to illness and medical intervention, past experiences, and significant personal concerns.

Common fears among patients often revolve around anesthesia, pain, the possibility of death, changes in body image (such as amputation or scarring), loss of autonomy, loss of control, and the sense of being invaded according to the hierarchy of organs determined by personal, cultural, and idiosyncratic factors and the unknown, but with a bivalent character as it represents the hope for a cure.

Surgical Psychoprophylaxis is a psychotherapeutic approach designed to support emotional, cognitive, interactional, behavioral functioning, in the context of surgical events. Its objectives include: Facilitating the processing of information, identify, express, and manage emotions and thoughts, make the implicit explicit, preventing emotional disorganization caused by lasting subconscious impressions, promoting recovery, reducing pain, minimizing psychological risks or problems in the postoperative period.

Psychological intervention can be carried out during:

1.     Late preoperative phase: From the moment surgery is recommended until hospitalization to review the meanings attributed to surgery, the patient's relationship with the surgeon, and pre-existing psychological functioning.

2.     Proximate Preoperative Phase: From hospitalization to entry into the operating room.

3.     Intraoperative Phase: During the surgical procedure itself.

4.     Postoperative Phase: From the moment the patient leaves the operating room until medical discharge.

With the following techniques:

Assessment with quantitative and projective tests, sessions to express anxiety related to the procedures or surgery, cognitive, behavioral, and relaxation strategies, among others.

Special considerations for children as when facing surgery they may exhibit aggressive or regressive behaviors, depression, passivity, or inexpressiveness. Their primary fears often involve separation from parents, physical harm, fear of unfamiliar or unknown environments, loss of self-control, privacy, and autonomy.