Korean J Child Health Nurs.  2004 Jan;10(1):80-88.

Anlysis of Fatigue Perceived by the Hospitalized Children's Mother

• Park IS
• Kim SJ
• Kang KA
• Kim TH

Abstract

PURPOSE
The purpose of this study was to explore the fatigue of the mothers of the hospitalized children's mothers in descriptive study. METHOD: Two hundred eighty three mothers who take care of the hospitalized children in three University hospitals were enrolled from June, 1 to October, 30, 2003. Data were collected using a questionnaire titled "Symptom Table on Fatigue Perception" designed by the Fatigue Research Committee of Japan, consisted of a total 30 items categorized into three sub-dimensions: the physical, the psychological and the neuro-sensory. SPSS was used for the analysis of data with 0.05 of significance. RESULT: 1) The mean average fatigue score of subjects was 1.94(SD:.48): the physical fatigue revealed the highest value with a mean of 2.19(SD:.57), followed by psychological fatigue with a mean score of 1.85(SD:.52), neuro-sensory fatigue with a mean of 1.79(SD:.51). 2) With the respect to the general characteristics of hospitalized children and mothers, there were statistically significant differences in the mothers' fatigue perception by the child sex(t=-2.697, p=.008), the character of child(F=9.032, p=.000), the child condition compared to pre-hospitalization(F=3.523, p=.031), with or without support in domestic households(t=-1.981, p=.049), the amount of sleeping time(t=2.704, p=.007), and with or without of night-time sleep disturbance because of the child hospitalization(t=2.082, p=.038).
CONCLUSION
These results suggest that health care professional need to be aware of the persistent presence of the maternal fatigue related to the child hospitalization and the factors worsen the degree of the fatigue.

MeSH Terms

Child
Child, Hospitalized
Delivery of Health Care
Fatigue*
Hospitalization
Hospitals, University
Humans
Japan
Mothers*
Child Health
Surveys and Questionnaires