Are Mental Health Teams Necessary in Cardiac Clinics?

Abstract

Although Kupst et al. acknowledge some of the limitations of their study of the role that mental health teams can play in helping parents cope with the diagnosis of congenital heart defects in their children, they seem to have ignored some of the broader implications of their work Most conspicuously omitted from consideration is the obvious influence on reactions to visiting a pediatric cardiac clinic for the first time (or at any time, for that matter) of the idividual differences on one or both parts of the doctor-patient dyad.