Parental behavior after perinatal death: lack of predictive demographic and obstetric variables.

Traditional care for mothers after stillbirth has been based on untested assumptions about appropriate parental behavior. To evaluate these assumptions, 165 families cared for by the Perinatal Mortality Counseling Program because of stillbirth or immediate neonatal death were offered a series of choices about their care, including how they wished to deal with their baby's death. Parental decisions were compared with selected demographic and obstetric features considered as underlying those decisions that traditionally have been made by physicians or the hospital staff. The authors found that parents desire contact with their baby, attention to their feelings, counseling from those providing their care, and information about their baby's death. Few demographic and obstetric features seemed to influence the choices. This suggests that physicians and hospital staff should not presume to determine the wishes of any parent or family faced with this tragedy.