Newborns' Bonding and Attachment, Their Rhythms and Needs, Supporting Parents Appropriately: Guidelines for Interventions During the Perinatal Period from the French National College Of Midwives.

A newborn's sleep-wake rhythms are very specific, neurologically determined, and different from the pattern of adults; they require an adaptable and predictable response by parents, which will promotes bonding and attachments, constructed at the early stages of development. It also will influence the quality of subsequent emotional relationships and adaptation to life events. This parental adaptability should receive multiprofessional support starting in the perinatal period, focused on the screening and management of psychological vulnerability.

Intervention during the Perinatal Period: Synthesis of the Clinical Practice Guidelines from the French National College of Midwives.

These clinical practice guidelines from the French National College of Midwives (CNSF) are intended to define the messages and the preventive interventions to be provided to women and co-parents by the different professionals providing care to women or their children during the perinatal period. These guidelines are divided into 10 sections, corresponding to 4 themes: 1/ the adaptation of maternal behaviors (physical activity, psychoactive agents); 2/ dietary behaviors; 3/ household exposure to toxic substances (household uses, cosmetics); 4/ promotion of child health (breastfeeding, attachment and bonding, screen use, sudden unexplained infant death, and shaken baby syndrome). We suggest a ranking to prioritize the different preventive messages for each period, to take into account professionals' time constraints.

Impact of the Perinatal Environment on the Child's Development: Implications for Prevention Policies.

Basic emotional security is central to the construction of the child and has an impact on the brain's organisation, the personal autonomy and the capacity to explore the world. The key concept of the attachment theory is supported by recent neuroimaging findings of brain development and the structuring of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axonal regulatory systems.In addition to the child's potential, the essential variable lies in the quality of the environment's responses, and consequently in the quality of the maternal security, from the very early intrauterine life. The understanding of the effects of parental stress during the early developmental stages is advancing. In France, the emotional security of pregnant women and future parents has become a major stake of perinatal policies for the prevention of developmental disorders.Specific strategies are being developed to improve both the maternal and the infant well-being. These are not restricted only to mental health specialists but rather involve every health-care professional of the perinatal period. The mechanisms of change for vulnerable parents emerge from the prospective analysis of support methods. Continuity and coherence of such care serve as a holding function, which enables the restructuring of previous emotional traumas.A new interdisciplinary perinatal medicine is emerging, structured rigorously around a well-coordinated obstetrical and paediatric follow-up. Considering the future of children, teenagers and adults, the stakes are enormous.