Stress and coping among mothers of children admitted to the paediatric intensive care unit (PICU).

Introduction: Planned or unplanned hospitalization increases the family's stress and anxiety level. Hospitalization creates stress, as it interrupts normal routines and places increased demands on parents who must further divide their time between normal responsibilities and their hospitalized child. Many parents feel a lack of control and a sense of powerlessness when their child is hospitalized. Objectives: The objectives of the study were to identify the level of stress and coping among mothers of children admitted to the paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) and to determine the correlation between stress and coping among mothers of children admitted to the PICU. Methods: The setting chosen for the present study was the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit of Sree Gokulam Medical College and Hospital. By employing techniques for consecutive sampling, 100 mothers were selected. The Modified Parental Stressor Scale (PSS) and Modified Coping Health Inventory for Parents (CHIP) were used to collect the data from mothers. Results: The present study found that most 94% of mothers had severe stress because of stressors, and only 6% had moderate stress. No one had mild stress. The present study found that 50% of mothers cope well with the stressors from their child's PICU admission, and the remaining 50% cope moderately with stressors. The results show that stressors had a significant association with the age of the mother, religion of the mother, mode of payment, development stage, history of previous admission, occupation of the mother and income. There was a weak positive correlation between stressors and coping strategies. Conclusion: Therefore, the study concluded that stressors influence the stress level of mothers of children admitted to the PICU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]