Parents of older and healthier newborns, with less social support, less resilient

Parents of older and healthier newborns, with less social support, less resilient

BALTIMORE – Parents of older, healthier newborns, who had less social support, were less resilient when their child was hospitalized in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU); which correlates to a greater number of symptoms of depression and anxiety, according to the Children's Research presented at the 2019 Annual Academic Societies Congress.

Resilience is the nascent but adaptable natural ability of people to rebound in the face of significant adversity. Published research indicates that high resilience is badociated with reduced psychological distress, but the phenomenon has not been extensively studied in parents of children hospitalized in a NICU.

"We know that having a child hospitalized at the NICU can be a time of stress for families," said Ololade Okito, MD, lead author of the cross-sectional study. "The good news is that when parents' resilience scores increase, we see a correlation with fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety." Parents who feel they have good family support also have higher resilience scores . "

The project is an offshoot of a large study examining the impact of peer mentoring from other NICU parents who have experienced the same strong emotions as their toddlers, sometimes successful and uncomfortable. sometimes in trouble.

The research team recruited 35 parents whose infants were 34 weeks gestation and younger, and administered a battery of validated investigations, including:

• The Connor-Davidson Resiliency Scale
• Inventory of anxiety characteristic of the state
• Multidimensional scale of perceived social support
• Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale and
• Parents Stress Scale – NICU

Forty percent of these parents had high resilience scores; parents whose infants averaged 27.3 weeks of gestation and who had more serious health problems reported greater resilience. In addition, 40% of these parents had high depressive symptoms, while 31% had positive anxiety screening. The research team writes that parents' distress affects the quality of parent-child interactions and the long-term development of the child.

"Higher stress badociated with NICU is badociated with greater symptoms of depression and anxiety in parents," said Lamia Soghier, MD, MEd, medical director of the neonatal intensive care unit for children and lead author of the study. "Specifically targeting interventions on these parents can help improve their resilience, reduce the stress of a child's parenting at the NICU and give these children a healthier start to life."

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Presentation of the 2019 Annual Conference of Pediatric Academic Societies

"Study on Parental Resilience and Psychological Distress in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (PARENT)"

o Tuesday, April 30, 2019 at 7:30 am (EST)

Ololade Okito, M.D., lead author; Yvonne Yui, M.D., co-author; Nicole Herrera, MPH, co-author; Randi Streisand, Ph.D., Chief of the Division of Psychology and Behavioral Health, and co-author; Carrie Tully, Ph.D., clinical psychologist and co-author; Karen Fratantoni, MD, MPH, Medical Director of the Complex Care Program and co-author; and Lamia Soghier, M.D., MEd, Director of Medical Unit, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and Senior Author; all the national children.

This story was published on: 2019-04-27. To contact the author, please use the contact information in the article.

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