Siblings and the new baby: changing perspectives.

Increasingly nurses are called on to provide services to siblings in childbearing families. An overview of the broad, interdisciplinary research on siblings and newborns that is available to guide nursing practice is provided in this article. Studies tend to fit into three categories: (a) sibling responses to the newborn, (b) sibling participation in birth, and (c) sibling visiting in the hospital. Although nurses may have only short-term contact with families during the childbearing cycle, the author emphasizes the importance of having a longitudinal, family-oriented understanding of sibling relationships based on current research. Suggestions for applying this research to practice during the prenatal, intrapartum, and postnatal periods are noted.