The Development and Evaluation of a Group Therapy Program for Perinatal Loss in Rural Appalachia

Perinatal loss can have vast adverse psychological consequences and has limited psychotherapeutic options to assist with those outcomes. Currently, there is no gold standard psychotherapy for the treatment of perinatal grief. Group therapy has proven to be an effective modality for various populations and has been shown to be beneficial for perinatal loss and the subsequent psychological outcomes. This study utilized a previously conducted systematic review to develop and evaluate a group psychotherapy for perinatal loss. The ten sessions of the group were completed by two participants and several constructs were explored pre- and post-intervention: grief, depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, self-efficacy, social support, couple’s satisfaction, and self-compassion. Results yielded non-significant changes pre- and post-intervention across all constructs. Additionally, qualitative feedback for each session was collected and is discussed. While the small sample size limits interpretation from this study as to the effectiveness of the intervention, this study does contribute to the growing literature which investigates the impact of group therapy on individuals who have experienced perinatal loss.