The diagnosis of cancer in children poses challenges in terms of physical,
emotional, and social aspects for all family members. In particular, parents
experience negative emotions such as depression, anxiety, and guilt due to the
uncertain and comple...
The diagnosis of cancer in children poses challenges in terms of physical,
emotional, and social aspects for all family members. In particular, parents
experience negative emotions such as depression, anxiety, and guilt due to the
uncertain and complex treatment process of their children.
However, families with high resilience are able to overcome these difficulties,
showing confidence in their potential growth and performing higher family
functions during the treatment process. As such, families that are well-adapted to
the treatment environment can play a buffering role in the stress experienced by the
child during the cancer treatment process and have a positive effect on the child’s
adaptation. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the adaptation of parents of
children with cancer through interventions that promote family resilience.
The purpose of this study was to develop an Internet-based family resilience
promoting program for parents of children with cancer and to verify its effect on
family resilience, depression, and family function.
The Internet-based family resilience promoting program for parents of children
with cancer is based on the Medical Research Council’s program development
framework and developed through a systematic literature review of resilience
promoting programs in families of children with cancer (n=8), Walsh’s (1998)
Family Resilience Framework, and the expert validation and preliminary
investigation. The effectiveness evaluation of the developed program was a block
randomization control group pre-post design, and a total of 41 primary caregivers
among the parents of children diagnosed with leukemia or lymphoma at Y
University hospital in Seoul, with 20 participants assigned to the experimental
group and 21 assigned to the control group, and was conducted from June to
October 2021. Each session of the program was conducted once per week for a total
70 minutes, comprising 10- minute for introduction, 50- minute for activity, and 10-
minute for closing. A total of 4 such sessions were conducted individually for
parents of children with cancer through an Internet-based program led by a nurse
for a 4-week period. The outcome variables were family resilience, depression, and
family function, and were measured through online questionnaire three times in
total: before, immediately after, and 4 weeks after completion of the program. The
collected data were analyzed through the linear mixed-effect model using SPSS
25.0, and satisfaction was evaluated through an online questionnaire and interview
after the program was completed.
The results are as follows: The experimental group that participated in the
Internet-based family resilience promoting program showed a more significant
difference in the amount of change in family resilience (β=13.214, p=.003) and
family function (β=1.256, p=.018) compared to the control group that did not
participate; however, there was no significant effect on depression (β=2.133,
p=.187). All subjects who participated in the program showed a high program
satisfaction score of 4.75 points out 5 points in total.
In conclusion, it was confirmed that the Internet-based family resilience
promoting program developed in this study is an appropriate intervention for
parents of children with cancer who are required to spend a considerable amount of
time caring for their children, with fewer time and place constraints involved and
providing convenient access. In addition, the nurse-led program will appropriately
assess the individual needs of each family and provide interventions that can
function at the physical, psychological, and social level, so that they can adequately
cope with various situations that occur during the treatment process of children with
cancer.