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Guiding the Hands That Hold the Child: Supportive Strategies for Low-Income Depressed Mothers and Their Children

College of Nursing, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, rcanuso{at}verizon.net

Working in a community setting with depressed low-income mothers and their children provides the psychiatric nurse with an ideal forum to promote mental health of both mother and child by creating and enacting strategies that target the mother's depression and the child's development, enhancing the developmental and mental health trajectory of both. This article describes the work of one advanced-practice psychiatric nurse who built a presence within a community-based early childhood antipoverty program to promote preventive mental health for women and young children challenged by poverty and the effects of welfare-to-work policies. The author highlights the connection between psychiatric nursing's phenomena of concern and the philosophy and the mission of Head Start and Early Head Start. Personal reflections and case study demonstrate that preventive interventions that promote healthy functioning for both mother and child are within the rich and diverse scope of psychiatric nursing's practice. J Am Psychiatr Nurses Assoc, 2007; 13(5), 304-312. DOI: 10.1177/1078390307308311

Key Words: welfare-to-work • maternal depression • Head Start • Early Head Start

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