RESUMEN
For the last three years, our oncology ICU (intensive care unit) has been opened to visiting children between 0 and 18 years. Our objective was to attempt to decrease the psychological burden in critically ill cancer patients and their children. We report here the evaluation of this new policy. Encouraged by the child psychologists in our hospital, we first recorded the opinions of the nursing staff, patients and relatives about this innovative approach. As our preliminary findings were favourable, a liberalised greeting and education policy for visiting children was implemented. A dedicated procedure was followed in order to provide children with a better understanding of their parent's disease, to alleviate any traumatic experience the visit might cause and to create an environment where mutual confidence would reign. After 2 years, each visiting child, patient, accompanying parent and the nursing staff were directly questioned using a specifically designed questionnaire. The daily lives of the staff, children, families and patients themselves appeared to be dramatically improved, even in the most difficult medical situations. Based on these promising results, the new policy has definitively been adopted in our unit. We propose that children ought to be allowed to visit a parent in the ICU and that this policy warrants evaluation in other types of units.
