Enhancing Mother Infant Interactions through Video Feedback Enabled Interventions in Women with Schizophrenia: A Single Subject Research Design Study

BACKGROUND: It has been shown that mother infant interactions are often impaired in mothers with schizophrenia. Contributory factors include psychotic symptoms, negative symptoms and surrogate parenting by others. AIM: This study describes the effectiveness of video feedback in enhancing mother-infant interaction in mothers with schizophrenia who have impaired interaction with their infant. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Two women with schizophrenia who were admitted for persistent psychotic symptoms and poor mothering skills, participated in the intervention. Pre intervention parenting assessment was done using video recording of mother infant interaction. Six sessions of mothering intervention were provided using video feedback and a repeat recording was done. Pre-and post-intervention videos were subsequently rated in a blind fashion by an independent expert in perinatal psychiatry using the pediatric infant parent exam (PIPE) scale. RESULTS: Pre and post intervention comparison of PIPE scores indicating significant improvement in several areas of mothering. CONCLUSIONS: Video feedback is a simple and inexpensive tool which can be used for improving mothering skills among mothers with postpartum psychosis or schizophrenia even in low resource settings.