CONCLUSION
Worldwide, data suggests that pediatric cases of COVID-19 are less
severe than adults56. However, the possibility that
their child might be infected creates worry and fear in parents,
especially if the child has a pre-existing condition such as cancer
where infection with COVID-19 might aggravate symptoms and pose an
additional risk to the child’s health. Preliminary results of our
longitudinal study, which will continue to investigate parental symptoms
and variables over the course of 9 months, show a significant positive
correlation between parental scores of traumatic impact of their child’s
cancer diagnosis (IES-R) and parental stress perception during the
COVID-19 outbreak (PSS).
The results of this study confirm that parents of pediatric cancer
patients have a high psychological risk for post-traumatic symptoms,
high stress levels, and the presence of clinically significant levels of
anxiety. There were no significant differences among groups of parents
depending on the amount of time since their child’s cancer diagnosis;
however, parents whose children were still receiving treatment
experienced the most psychological distress.
This study confirms the importance of caring for the well-being of the
parents, and that attention must also be paid to their needs throughout
their child’s entire disease process, even at a time remote from
diagnosis 52,30. This is especially true in the case
of a major health emergency such as the COVID-19 pandemic. During an
emergency, where psychological problems might arise for the general
population, the situation for parents caring for a child with a complex
diagnosis could be aggravated by psychological consequences as well as
infection control policies that have an impact on the quality of life56.
It is therefore essential to continuously monitor the psychological
state of this population. The COVID-19 pandemic has introduced new
challenges for the organization of health services and multidisciplinary
work 58. This study highlights the importance of
integrating care for the parents with care for the child through
continuous monitoring of their psychological state and the need for
parent-oriented interventions.
The present study is limited by the absence of a comparison group of
parents who have not experienced the pandemic, and there is no control
group of parents whose children do not have a cancer diagnosis. We will
attempt to increase the reliability of the investigation by making
comparisons between subjects with the re-test that will be performed,
according to the study’s protocol, in the coming months.