Introduction: Post-traumatic stress disorder is a mental disorder that can occur in individuals after exposure to a traumatic experience or event. Childbirth can be a cause of post-traumatic stress disorder too if a woman perceives it to be traumatic. Childbirth trauma can either be objective or subjective. Complications in birth are not necessary for a woman to perceive birth as a traumatic experience as it can be a matter of personal experience as well. This stress-related disorder interferes with a woman's daily activities and has a devastating effect on interpersonal relationships, especially with her partner and child. Purpose: The purpose of the bachelor’s thesis was to define the concept of lesser-known postpartum post-traumatic stress disorder and to determine the role of a nurse in the basic life activities of a patient with this illness. Methods: We used the descriptive method and reviewed the literature published between 2009-2010. We used fully accessible articles published in English or Slovenian language. Articles also had to be relevant to the topic of our bachelor’s thesis. We used remote access to the University of Ljubljana to browse databases Cinahl, Medline, Wiley online library, Science direct, and web browser Google Scholar. The literature search took place from February to April 2022. For the bachelor’s thesis, we finally used 50 units of literature. Discussion and conclusion: Identification of patients at risk for developing postpartum post-traumatic stress disorders remains crucial. Perinatal nurses are placed in an ideal position to recognize such patients and enable further care even after discharge from maternity wards. The nurse needs to establish a trusting relationship in which patients feel safe and can describe and express their feelings about their birth experience. In patients with postpartum post-traumatic stress disorder, problems, such as sleeping disorders, damaged relationships, eating disorders, and a lack of exercise, occur. At this stage, the nurse provides counseling and health education primarily so that women can improve their quality of life and deal with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder effectively.
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