Reviewing interventions supporting parents' well-being after a child’s intensive care unit discharge

Aim: To review research on interventions to support the psychological well-being of parents after their child’s discharge from Paediatric Intensive Care. Background: Having a child admitted to a Paediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) is a highly stressful experience and post-traumatic stress among parents is well documented. How best to support these parents is currently unclear. Review Methods: Searches were conducted using Medline, PsycINFO, PubMed, CINAHL and The Cochrane library in January 2017. Study selection was carried out using pre-specified criteria. Following appraisal of methodological quality and risk of bias, data were extracted and analysed using a narrative synthesis. Findings: Six quantitative studies met the inclusion criteria. Intervention types included follow-up appointments, telephone calls, educational information and post admission interviews. Insufficient evidence was found to fully support any intervention in isolation but findings support a clear trend that some form of follow-up is beneficial. Conclusions and recommendations: Testing costly interventions is challenging and takes time. In the meantime, a low-cost intervention (such as an information leaflet) to raise awareness of potential problems to staff and to provide a support resource for parents is recommended. Relevance to clinical practice Parents and carers of children admitted to PICU can develop post-traumatic stress symptoms after their child’s discharge from PICU. This paper addresses how best to support these parents to improve their psychological well-being.

This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Bench, S., and Bedford, Z. (2018). Reviewing interventions supporting parents' well-being after a child’s intensive care unit discharge. Nursing in Critical Care, which has been published in final form at 10.1111/nicc.12405 This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived Versions.