RESULTS
The study included the parents of 45 patients (32 with solid tumors and 13 with malignant hematological diseases). They were divided into 2 groups, those who had completed their treatment regimen (off-therapy group, n = 27) and those who were still receiving treatment (in-treatment group, n = 18). There were 18 females and 27 males.
One father had died, 1 father had psychiatric disorders, and 5 parents (1 mother and 4 fathers) did not fill in the questionnaires. Therefore, a total of 80 parents (44 mothers and 36 fathers) were included in the study. All parents agreed to participate and provided written informed consent. Demographic characteristics of the participants are summarized in Table 1.
A total of 87.5% of the parents had a moderate (n = 20) or high (n = 50) risk for traumatic disorder (IES-R, x = 41.68 ±16.72), and 83.7% had a moderate (n = 54) or high (n = 13) presence of stress symptoms (PSS, mean = 19.25 ± 5.33). In our sample 75% of parents exhibited remarkable levels of anxiety, with 60 subjects in state scale and 45 subjects in trait scale having scores that reached and exceeded the STAI-Y cut off. The mean values were Y1 (state), x = 42.48 ± 4.32 and Y2 (trait), x = 41.15 ± 4.56.
The bivariate matrix of correlation (Figure 1) found a strong significant positive correlation between the IES-R and PSS scores (r = 0.55, P < 0.001). There was a positive correlations between the PSS and PedsQL (emotional needs) scale (P < 0.001) and a negative correlation between IES-R and STAI-Y (P < 0.001).
It was not possible to make comparisons between the parents of patients diagnosed during and before the pandemic due to the inhomogeneity between the groups. However, the 8 parents interviewed whose children were diagnosed during the pandemic had an average IES-R of 50.28. Since there was a weak correlation (P > 0.05) between the time from diagnosis to completing the IES-R, the sample was further divided according to the time from diagnosis, < 24, 24 - 48, and > 48 months. In figure 2 the trend line shows a decrease over time, but the difference between the groups is not significant, and in the third group (x > 48 months) there is also a large dispersion of scores. Comparisons between the groups were also made separating parents into those with and without high trait anxiety (divided according to the STAI-Y2 cut-off). Even this group of patients did not have significant differences in any of the test variables.
Separating the groups into those off and on therapy found that this variable had a significant impact on the outcome of IES-R (P< 0.001; off-therapy, x = 36.60 ± 4.84; on-therapy, x = 49.55 ±16.23) and PSS (P < 0.001; off-therapy, x=18.10 ± 4.84; on-therapy, x = 21.03 ± 5.64). Subsequent comparisons between groups found a significant difference between the scores of mothers and fathers only on the PSS (P < 0.001; mothers, x = 20.89 ± 4.90; fathers, x = 17.20 ± 5.21).