Perinatal and Neonatal Palliative Care: Interdisciplinary Care, Family Support, and Symptom Management
A special issue of Children (ISSN 2227-9067). This special issue belongs to the section "Pediatric Anesthesiology, Pain Medicine and Palliative Care".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 10 October 2026 | Viewed by 164
Special Issue Editor
2. Connecticut Children’s Medical Center, Hartford, CT 06106, USA
Interests: neonatal care and outcomes; complex fetal diagnosis and therapy; neonatal/perinatal palliative care; neonatal pain management; bereavement experiences; counseling and shared decision-making
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
We are pleased to invite submissions to the Special Issue “Perinatal and Neonatal Palliative Care: Interdisciplinary Care, Family Support, and Symptom Management.” Neonatal-perinatal palliative care is a comprehensive, interdisciplinary approach that enhances quality of life for infants and families facing serious, complex, life-limiting, or life-threatening conditions diagnosed during pregnancy or the neonatal period. Care focuses on preventing and relieving suffering through timely assessment and management of pain and other distressing symptoms while addressing the psychosocial, emotional, and spiritual needs of both infants and their families.
Recent advances in prenatal diagnostics, neonatal intensive care, and medical technologies have allowed for earlier identification of these diagnoses. The complexity involved in all potential care paths underscores the ethical, emotional, and decision-making challenges faced by families and care teams. Neonatal-perinatal palliative care is essential in providing compassionate, family-centered support and value-driven medical care throughout the remainder of the pregnancy and, when appropriate, during neonatal care, end-of-life care, and bereavement.
This care is individualized, guided by parental values, goals, and cultural perspectives, and may be provided alongside disease-directed, life-prolonging, or comfort-focused therapies. The aim is to support families through complex and often uncertain medical journeys with thoughtful communication, ethical decision-making, and comprehensive symptom management.
This Special Issue welcomes original research, reviews, case series, quality improvement projects, and perspectives that advance clinical practice, education, program development, and policy in neonatal-perinatal palliative care. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: program implementation, family-centered approaches, birth planning for life-limiting diagnoses, ethical and cultural considerations, constraints on care, the impact of the medicolegal landscape, pain and symptom management, multidisciplinary care, bereavement support, and outcomes in medically complex neonates.
We look forward to receiving your contributions.
Dr. DonnaMaria E. Cortezzo
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Children is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- perinatal palliative care
- neonatal palliative care
- end-of-life symptom management
- pain management
- family-centered care
- end-of-life care
- birth planning
- ethical decision-making
- bereavement support
- multidisciplinary care
Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue
- Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
- Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
- Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
- External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
- Reprint: MDPI Books provides the opportunity to republish successful Special Issues in book format, both online and in print.
Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.
