Barn till föräldrar som har kontakt med vuxenpsykiatrin - hur har de det? : Rapport från en nationell studie

• Mental illness in adults such as depression, anxiety or bipolar disorder are nowadays a significant public health problem. Many of those with mental illness are parents of underage children. A parents’ mental illness affects children’s development and wellbeing, but this association is mediated by parental skills and the relation between child and parent. In summary, at a group level there is an increased risk that the children also develop mental illness, even if it does not need to be so in every individual case.Children’s need for information, advice and support has to be considered according to the Swedish Health Care Act if a parent is mentally ill. A number of different interventions are available that can be used in order to meet this need. At the same time, it has to be evaluated how these interventions work in a Swedish context.This report is about a study on how children with parents who are patients in adult psychiatry do with regard to mental health and general family situation. The study is part of a larger research project with the aim to evaluate interventions (Beardslee Family Intervention, Let’s talk about children and treatment as usual/other interventions) for support to children at 8 to 17 years of age who have parents with depression, dysthymia, anxiety and/or bipolar disease. In total, parents, both patients and their partners, of 88 children are included in the study and 19 children have also participated. They answered a number of questionnaires. Parents estimated their children’s mental health, their own psychological wellbeing, their life situation in general, their relation to their current partner, their experience of control of their child’s behavior and different aspects of family climate and function. Children reported their own mental health and some aspects of family climate and function.The results show that parents in our study report significantly higher levels of mental ill-health in their children than parents in a non-clinical norm group. Children report higher symptom load than parents concerning emotional problems, hyperactivity/inattention and total problem score. Those parents who are psychiatric patients report as expected lower psychological wellbeing than their partners, but also several partners indicate own psychological problems on a clinical level. Patients and their partners give a consistent estimation of their relation. Considerably more participants as compared to a normal group report concerning high stress levels in their relation.Interventions for children as next of kin are often regarded as indicated preventions that aim to decrease the risk for mental illness in adulthood, but the results of this study indicate that there may be need for early treatment instead.The study points out the importance that practitioners in adult psychiatry in agreement with the law find out if there are children in the family and even ask about how the patients perceive their child’s psychological and physical wellbeing, if there are other significant persons around the child and how available they are as a support for the child, how relations between other family members are and how parenthood is experienced.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Psykologi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Psychology (hsv//eng)

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