Little is known about the development of posttraumatic growth among parents of children with serious advanced disease. The purpose of this study is to describe parental posttraumatic growth 100 days after pediatric stem cell transplant. This is a…
BACKGROUND: Memory making is the process of creating mementos of a child with a life limiting condition, who may be at or near end of life, providing a tangible and visual connection to the child who has died. AIM: This study explored the lived…
OBJECTIVE: Living with a child with a life-limiting condition (LLC), for which there is no hope of cure and premature death is expected, places much stress on a family unit. Familial communication has the potential to serve as a buffer when children…
BACKGROUND: Living with a child who has a life-limiting condition (LLC) is likely to have a major impact on all family members. There is a need to have a clearer understanding of the nature and extent of this impact on parents and well-siblings. The…
Aim: To identify and assess the quality of decision aids that align the decision, values and information provided for parents making end-of-life or palliative care decisions for children with life-threatening conditions. Method(s): Six databases and…
BACKGROUND: While several studies have examined 'what' families want with regard to the place of a child's end-of-life care and death, few have explored 'how' parents reach a decision. AIMS: (1) to develop a model explaining how parents of a child…
Parents of ill children have willingly identified their personal beliefs about what they should do or focus on to fulfill their own internal definition of being a good parent for their child. This observation has led to the development of the…
Background: Most parents vividly recall the weeks, days, and moments preceding their child's death for years to come. Dissatisfaction with communication about their child's condition and lack of guidance can contribute to stress prior to a child's…
The purpose of this study was to describe the impact of peer support on post-traumatic stress disorder in parents who have experienced the death of a child, the factors associated with the parents' post-traumatic stress reactions and the parents'…
BACKGROUND:: Studies involving samples of children with life-threatening illnesses and their families face significant challenges, including inadequate sample sizes and limited diversity. Social media recruitment and Web-based research methods may…
Aims: This feasibility study aimed to systematically identify and address the support needs of parents of children with life-limiting illnesses and to assess whether the systematic approach was acceptable and relevant to parents. Method(s): The CSNAT…
BACKGROUND: Decision making is a highly complex task when providing care for seriously ill children. Physicians, parents, and children face many challenges when identifying and selecting from available treatment options., METHODS: This qualitative…
Caring for a child with a neuromuscular condition such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) presents many challenges, including managing the emotional impact of the diagnosis, managing extended periods of profound uncertainty, navigating the…
Aim: The role of parents in decision-making concerning their child's end-of-life care is not clearly defined. Their participation is encouraged by ethical reflection, in particular by the CCNE (French National Ethics Advisory Committee), but laws are…
OBJECTIVE: To explore bereaved parents' judgements of healthcare providers, as part of a larger study examining their perceptions of the death of a child in the paediatric intensive care unit. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY: Constructivist grounded theory.…
PURPOSE: To explore bereaved parents' perspectives of parent and staff roles in the pediatric intensive care unit when their child was dying, and their relationships with healthcare staff during this time. DESIGN AND METHODS: Constructivist grounded…
BACKGROUND: Memory making is the process of creating mementos of a child with a life limiting condition, who may be at or near end of life, providing a tangible and visual connection to the child who has died. AIM: This study explored the lived…
Kim, aged 3 years, lies asleep, waiting for a miracle. Outside her room, the nurses on the night shift pad softly through the half-lighted corridors, stopping to count breaths, take pulses, or check the intravenous pumps. In the morning, Kim will…
AIM: Understanding of coping strategies that parents use before the death of their child is crucial, and will enable us to best provide support. The current study aimed to explore parents' coping strategies, and map these onto an existing theoretical…
OBJECTIVE: While improvements in healthcare have resulted in children with complex and life-threatening conditions living longer, a proportion of them still die. The death of a child puts parents at increased risk for anxiety, depression, and…
AIM: Understanding of coping strategies that parents use before the death of their child is crucial, and will enable us to best provide support. The current study aimed to explore parents' coping strategies, and map these onto an existing theoretical…
Background: Individuals with cystic fibrosis (CF) face the challenges of managing a chronic, progressive disease. While palliative care is a standard of care in serious illnesses, there are no guidelines for its incorporation into CF care. Patients…
The Boston Children's Hospital Hematology/Oncology Bereavement Program has supported bereaved parents for three decades following the death of their child from cancer or blood disorder. An analysis of the current bereavement program as well as a…
Context Bereaved parents may have heightened risk for decisional regret; however, little is known about regret early in bereavement. Objectives We characterized decisional regrets endorsed by parents of children who died from cancer within the first…
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Decisional regret is common in bereaved parents. We aimed to identify factors associated with and to explain patterns of parental decisional regret. METHODS: We used a convergent mixed-methods design including quantitative…
The demands of caring for a child with a life-limiting condition can have a profound impact on parents' health and wellbeing. Currently, there is no standard procedure for identifying and addressing the support needs of these parents. Aim: To assess…
AIM: The ability to communicate serious news to patients and families in a caring and compassionate way is a critical skill for physicians. This study explores the impact of a novel communication skills workshop that included bereaved parents in role…
Research Framework: In serious illness, the proliferation of therapeutic possibilities often delays the moment when death is foreseen and when palliative care, too often associated with the end of life and death, is introduced into patients’ care…
Few studies have described the goals and wishes of parents caring for their children with rare diseases, specifically when children are unable to communicate their preferences directly. The purpose of this study was to describe the parent's…
To examine the parent's experiences of bonding in the care of newborns who were seriously ill during the neonatal period and did not survive. Design: Data were collected through 7 interviews with 10 parents whose infants were cared for and died in a…
OBJECTIVES: Neonatal palliative care (NPC) is an emerging subset of care in United States (US) neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) that provides relief for both infants and families at the end of life for infants with terminal diagnoses. Families…
The emotional turmoil associated with extremely preterm birth is inescapable parents. How each parent handles the unexpected, makes sense of the unknown and learns to parent their child is uniquely personal. A rigid standardized approach to support…
Introduction. Parents of a child diagnosed with a life-threatening illness often experience the state of cognitive and emotional disorganization. The key factor determining parents-physicians cooperation is the quality of their relations. That is why…
Background: End-stage renal disease (ESRD) affects nearly 1400 new children each year in the United States. Morbidity and mortality rates remain high for pediatric patients with ESRD, including those that have received a renal transplant. Objective:…
Physicians often disclose serious news with patients and families; however, many clinicians experience anxiety around these conversations.1 Fear of their patients' and their own emotional reactions may cause providers to avoid these conversations…
We aimed to characterize the parent experience of caring for an infant with neonatal encephalopathy. In this mixed-methods study, we performed semistructured interviews with parents whose infants were enrolled in an existing longitudinal cohort study…
When medicine proves to be powerless to cure a child suffering from cancer, there remains the path of accompaniment by what we call palliative care. This is very different from the treatments that have been administered up to now - since they are not…
OBJECTIVE: This multicenter, parallel-group, randomized trial examined the effects of an animal-assisted intervention on the stress, anxiety, and health-related quality of life for children diagnosed with cancer and their parents. METHOD: Newly…
Objective: To investigate critical care physicians' experiences and perspectives regarding follow-up meetings with parents after a child's death in the pediatric intensive care unit. Parents of children who die in the pediatric intensive care unit…
