Parental coping and activities during pediatric critical care

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the relationship of locus of control, parental age, and state anxiety to parental coping and activities performed during hospitalization of a child in a pediatric critical care center. DESIGN: Cross-sectional. SETTING: Pediatric critical care center at a university medical center. PARTICIPANTS: A convenience sample of 47 parents of 47 children hospitalized in a critical care center. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Parental coping strategies and activities performed during hospitalization in a critical care center. RESULTS: Older, more self-directed and less anxious parents were found to use coping strategies focusing on problem solving rather than on their emotional response to a child's hospitalization. Further, those who used the problem-focused coping modes were more likely to be involved in caring for the child, while parents who used emotion-focused coping modes participated less in care activities. CONCLUSIONS: Appropriate strategies to bolster coping and reduce stress of parents need to be constantly reassessed because coping mechanisms vary according to parental age, locus of control, anxiety level, and parental involvement in child-care activities. More research is needed in the changes of parental coping mechanisms with time and child-care activity, to assess the benefits of interventions planned to encourage a problem-focused approach.

Complementary and alternative medicine use amongst Malaysian orthopaedic oncology patients

“…Parents of paediatric oncology patients also seemed lop-sided to-wards problem-focused factors. During conventional treatment, parents often play a passive role with little opportunity for active involvement in the healing process of their children [ 33 ]. Coping strategies focusing on problem-solving are action-centred and enables more involvement in care activities of their child [ 33 ].…”

“…During conventional treatment, parents often play a passive role with little opportunity for active involvement in the healing process of their children [ 33 ]. Coping strategies focusing on problem-solving are action-centred and enables more involvement in care activities of their child [ 33 ]. Other reasons such as improving psychological well-being and finding hope, taking more control over own treatment, allowing to relax/sleep may be described as emotion-focused factors and were less frequently mentioned (<20% frequency) in our study.…”

Strategies for feeling secure influence parents’ participation in care

“…Hospitalization of a child is a stressful situation for a parent. How parents experience and cope with the situation is dependent upon both individual and situational factors ( Lazarus & Folkman, 1984; LaMontaigne & Pawlak, 1990; LaMontaigne et al ., 1992 ). Individual factors can include age, gender, anxiety and preference for control.…”

Determinants of parental behaviour when children undergo day‐care surgery

“…Parents’ participation in a child's care has generally been evaluated by parental self‐reporting (Caty et al. 1989, LaMontagne et al. 1992, Romaniuk & Kristjansson 1995) and, less frequently, by observing their behaviour in hospital (Dahlquist et al.…”