8. So, my practical intervention path began, in 1997, by directly contacting institutions which routinely use Kangaroo Method (KM) and specialists who use VIG in dyadic relationships in health services. This contact was achieved in AMC in Holland, where KM has been implemented since 1985. After an initial experimental phase, it became a current practice, in which parents have a crucial role at the end of the day, in an alternate way. I interviewed Doctor Richard de Leeuw , then I was introduced to the team, visited the unit, asked permission to two families and had the chance to film two fathers performing K (one already had some practice with this contact, the other was doing it for the first time and so was nervous, anxious and thrilled) with a view to disseminate and modulate it in Portugal. The contact and further study of VIG was carried out along with specialists that supervise VIG performance by professionals from a number of institutions (such as the Hospital of Hoorn and the Hospital of Groningen) – mostly were done by Susan Anneveldt. With this specialist, I analysed the recordings performed in AMC, followed her activities in the hospital and participates in the managements she carries out there. I also witnessed the management she receives from Harrie Biemans from time to time. With this practical “mini handbook” of VIG in my mind and the video recordings, I felt ready to initiate the intervention in Portugal. I arrived at Coimbra with my mind set on performing the practical intervention in Maternidade Bissaya Barreto (MBB), as I had had a personal contact at the end of 1994 and beginning of 1995, when our niece was born premature. By then, I already had a videotape VHS about KM in The Netherlands, which I had obtained from SPIN when I started researching VHT, for which I had the material, interiorisation and skills we acquired in The Netherlands. I agreed on a contract after interviews with the Director of MBB, the Director of NICU, the Managing Nurse, The Chief Nurse and the Director of the EIU (Early Intervention Unit). As my request was accepted, I had my first meeting with the NICU team, where I specified the practical aspects of my presence and way of acting inside the unit and access to parents. The video recordings of K procedure in AMC were used in this meeting. These caused a curious and rewarding receptivity: the professionals debated uniforms, technical material, similarities and differences in the monitors, the fact that parents don’t use hospital coats or any other protection, fathers doing K without shirts sitting on comfortable chairs (deck chairs), which I considered as a mental predisposition to the practical possibilities encompassed by my presence and intervention in that unit. When I first approached the parents with a letter of consent request, the tape with Dutch parents performing KM, and some scales, I was concerned with what I would find: pain, suffering, hope, sadness, receptivity, rejection… How would I deal with any of these emotions and let my interest, respect and true concern in helping to minimise pain show? I felt these questions quite strongly. First parents: excellent receptivity. We watched the videotape with Dutch recordings and questions were made and answered. I immediately felt their interest and anxiety in being able to share this contact with their daughters (these parents had two little premature twins, as a result of IVF). However, this result did not avoid the previous questions, as each couple of parents represented a new challenge, a new unknown reaction, a new pain, a new contact with people who could not wish I to support them (or to invade their personal experience and relationship privacy) – with all the respect and understanding due to this refusal, even if trusting that parents would be able to feel a skin-to-skin contact if they wished to do it, then deciding whether they wanted to repeat it and with what frequency. In this process of practical intervention, which approximately lasted three years, interrupted by some trips to The Netherlands for management and guidance on VIG performance, I initially had one definite refusal by a couple who had received the information that their daughter presented a brain ecography revealing problems in the motor and mental sections. By the same time, another mother refused to participate after speaking with the former, who considered K and VIG inappropriate. However, when the team proposed K to that second mother, she accepted it and agreed with the experiment. She sought me and asked to be filmed in care and skin-to-skin contact, but requested that I did not disseminate it. I assured her I would not. She felt quite satisfied with K and expressed enormous pleasure in showing the recorded images to their family. Besides these two cases, there was no other refusal. As a matter a fact, I had some requests, some included in the sample (according to the random distribution) and others outside its scope (which were not included, as they did not fit into our eligibility criteria), but foreseen in the application of VIG. Some requests arose because parents felt attracted by the image recording and other requests because they were wondering why other parents would be so special in that they were being filmed and followed by that psychologist and they did not. So I explained them why this research was important and the fact that I had to obey to certain criteria, which did not prevent me from filming and following them during that period. In what concerns the recorded infants and parents, I always brought the consent letter to be signed when they accepted participating. They also indicated if they authorized or not the viewing of the images by other professionals or parents, when subject to the intervention with VIG and/or VHT. Then I’d follow around 20 dyads at maternity, each contact parents-premature infant were filmed for 15 to 30 minutes, the sequence and visit to the incubator with recording and meeting to view the recordings happened between 1 and 3 times, depending on the need and parental availability. The reviews of films were made in an adequate room, which I oriented according to the criteria and items of the orientation tables of the VIG method. With 5 of those families (living in the neighbourhood) I scheduled home visit with the parents that would proceed with the VHT intervention. During the home visit, I filmed some moments of parents-child contact. Afterwards, we scheduled the visit for viewing the films. I had 2 “filming visit” and “viewing visit” sequences, which amounted to 4 home visits, each family. That’s endured till end of 2000.