Korean J Child Health Nurs.  2001 Oct;7(4):451-460.

Family Stress, Perceived Social Support, and Coping of Mothers Who have a Child Newly Diagnosed with Congenital Heart Disease

• Tak YR

Abstract

Congenital heart disease is now estimated to be the most prevalent chronic illness in children. The overall purpose of study is to enhance our understanding of mother's perception of family stress, perceived social support, and coping who has a child newly diagnosed with congenital heart disease. In this investigation, the relationship between family stress, perceived social support, and coping within the context of a acute, non life- threatening chronic illness in the situation of newly diagnosed as Rolland's typology of chronic illness. The study employed data from a subset of a large longitudinal study, children's chronic illness: parents and family adaptation conducted by M. McCubbin (5 R29 NR02563) which was funded by the NIH. The subject for this study were 92 mothers who have a child under age 12 who was newly diagnosed with congenital heart disease within the last 3-4 months. Results form correlational and regression analysis revealed that perceived social support operated as a resiliency factor between family stress and coping of mothers. Child and family characteristics appeared to be important predictors of perceived social support and mother's coping. Therefore, the findings provide an incremental contribution to the explanation of effects for perceived social support and may challenge resiliency model in previous literature. Further, these findings suggest that perceived social support and coping are both influencing in the resiliency of relatively high risk groups of families who has a child with congenital heart disease.

MeSH Terms

Child*
Chronic Disease
Family Characteristics
Financial Management
Heart Defects, Congenital*
Humans
Longitudinal Studies
Mothers*
Parents
Child Health