Carolyn, I would refer you to Dr. Denise Coppa of URI who grappled with
similar issues in her doctoral studies of a similar population.
dcoppa@.... DWS
On Jul 7, 2004, at 10:25 AM, Carolyn Herrington wrote:

> I would like to take a moment to thank all of you who attended the NY
> conference who so willingly shared time, talent, and philosophy! This
> was
> the third Rogerian Conf. I have attended, and I always come away
> renewed in
> my convictions, and challenged to take time to reflect on the
> principles of
> the SUHB.
>
> As an emerging scholar and researcher, and a Doc Candidate at Wayne
> State,
> where I had the wonderful opportunity to be challenged in growth by
> Effie
> Hanchett, I have a question to pose for discussion. I am in the midst
> of
> proposal writing, which of course means defense. The focus of my
> research is
> pain assessment in the Newborn ICU. Our current methods focus on
> pattern
> manifestation but do not provide the specificity and sensitivity to
> truly
> inform us about this experience. Additionally, there is very little
> research
> to date about the long term effects of the pain experience for infants
> exposed to repetitive pain. The guiding principles are to improve our
> approach to assessing the pain experience, and introducing a
> developmental
> support researched by Dr. Heidelise Als for use as a means decreasing
> the
> pain response, and fostering harmonious development in what can be a
> very
> stressful environment. I'm aware of Als' Newborn Individual
> Developmental
> Care Program (NIDCAP) and while I believe this approach offers a rich
> field
> for furthering our understanding of patterning to enhance harmony. She
> uses
> patterning of the environmental field to support the infant in
> appropriate
> development. "Nesting" of the infant is a component of her approach,
> which
> encourages supporting the infant in the position she/he would likely
> be in
> within the uterus. In my research I am planning to use this positioning
> approach to reduce the pain experience related to heel-stick for blood
> sampling, but the positioning will be provided by human hands - thus
> providing not only the physical support towards self-comfort, but
> adding
> human touch and human presence. I will employ the primary approaches to
> assessing the response currently included in our cadre of response
> patterns,
> but will be adding measurement of salivary cortisol in an attempt to
> better
> reflect the response at a deeper level.
>
> The chief presenting challenge of my study thus far are "how can you
> defend
> the use of such a cellular measure like salivary corts, as Rogerian?"
> I have my own thoughts on this, as well as others to be grappled with
> in the
> proposal, but thought this might provide an excellent opportunity for
> those
> of you much more steeped in Rogerian Science to dialogue on such an
> approach
> to pattern identification, and patterning concepts for this population
> whose
> own pattern manifestations we are so poorly able to recognize at this
> point
> in time! And, of course, it can provide me the excellent opportunity to
> learn at the every expanding "knee" of the master scholars.
>
> I welcome your input, and hope some of you may find this an interesting
> topic for discussion! Looking forward to Savannah again!
>
> In full appreciation of your energies,
> Carolyn Herrington
>
> If you would like to send additional info directly to me:
> herring1@...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>