O papel da fantasia em crianças face ao ato cirúrgico

Abstract

Surgery is an experience that brings uncomfortable examinations and discomfort and can often become an incomprehensible and traumatic experience. In the case of pediatric surgery, there is a belief that children are not always in a position to understand and deal with what surgery encompasses, considering that their psychic apparatus is still being formed. These procedures are, obviously, accompanied by numerous fantasies in an attempt to defense themselves and recover emotional balance to be able to face the situation. Therefore, this was a qualitative, descriptive and exploratory study to investigate children s fantasies the day before surgery, in psychoanalytic theory. Seven children were included, of both sexes, five to twelve years old, admitted in a public hospital for surgery during 2014. Play Time and Fables Test were used as instruments. The implementation of the instruments was performed in a single moment, recorded, transcribed verbatim and the data was then passed through content analysis. The participants expressed the perception of themselves as defective and possessed feelings of fragility, helplessness and had many fears. The presence of frightening and elaborative fantasies was identified as a defense attempt and a way of making sense of surgical experience. It was concluded that the fantasies had a paradoxical role; that is, even if they constituted a regressive defense, they proved to be protective structure and helped to make sense of the surgical experience.