Irina Banienė, Nida Žemaitienė
Abstract
Diagnosis of childhood cancer is one of the strongest, most devastating and affecting experiences taken into consideration by parents. It is commonly accepted that a message about a child’s life-threatening disease might develop a post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS). The aim of the research: to select and review publications related with post-traumatic stress symptoms, which affect parents, who have children with oncological diseases. Methodology: a systematic review. Results: the systematic review revealed the variety of valuation techniques used in scientific researches. The articles included in the systematic analysis show that post-traumatic stress symptoms are mostly evaluated according to the impact of event scale (IES-R) and PTSD checklist – civil version (PCL-C). Despite the benefits of longitudinal researches mentioned in many articles, many models are still based on the instantaneous tracking study. As per results of the systematic review, there is a wide range of factors that can affect the development of post-traumatic stress symptoms in parents who have children with oncological diseases. These are socio-demographic factors associated with the specifics of treatment, emotional state of children, traumatic experience and the coping strategies of parents, relationship between parents and children, etc. The cultural context is also important when analysing factors that might affect the development of PTSS. In order to help the parents who have children with oncological diseases function better, it is crucial to study the post-traumatic stress symptoms that occur as well as predisposed and protecting factors.
Keyword(s): post-traumatic stress symptoms; parents; pediatric patients with oncological diseases.
DOI: 10.5200/sm-hs.2015.059
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