Emotional trauma after a child's injury
Tuesday, January 12th, 2010
By: Maiken Scott
mscott@whyy.org
In the aftermath of a child's injury, parents often struggle with pain of their own. A new study from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia examines how parents cope psychologically after a child is injured.
Listen:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Doctors at the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at the Children's Hospital found that one month after a child's injury, 37 percent of parents experienced symptoms of traumatic stress including high levels of anxiety.
Even after six months after the child's injury, 15 percent of those parents had symptoms.
Dr. Flaura Koplin Winston of the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at the Children's Hospital co-authored the study.
Winston: This is a very difficult time, to go through a child's injury, it's very scary, and to have some patience with yourself but to also understand that if your reactions are becoming severe they are getting in the way of normal recovery, they are getting in the way of your child's recovery, or they go on for more than a month, it's time to get some outside help.
Dr. Linda Welsh is director of the Anxiety Treatment Center in Bala Cynwd. She says the whole family could be affected when symptoms of traumatic stress in parents are not treated:
Welsh: Like sleeplessness, over-concern about the child's welfare, and the problem is, this can then reinforce any anxieties that the child could be developing.
Welsh says in an effort to move on, many families don't talk about a child's injury. But she says it's helpful to discuss what happened and how different family members feel about the incident.
As to who is more likely to develop these symptoms, experts at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia say the severity of a child's injury and whether a parent was present did not affect the development of traumatic stress.
The findings from this study and other research have been incorporated into a website which helps families navigate recovery from an injury.
I was thinking of employing BlogEngine but then I saw that most for this internet sites I looked either had comments full of spam or they had simply closed the comments altogether. I hope which you have been able to combat the spam because at the moment it is something that is doing me stay away from BE.
My then 29 y.o daughter had (an apparent seizure)driving home from work. She crashed through a wooden fence, finally coming to rest less than 1 ft from an inground pool. The fence impaled her in the right temporal lobe. Thankfully the homeowner sat with my daughter & did not try to move her. She was airlifted to the local trauma hospital. My daughter was within 4 houses of being home. When her husband called us to let us know there had been an accident we were very frightened, but never imagined how horrific the crash was until were on seen & then at the hospital. We were placed in the room where families are given tragic news. We waited hours for news, when we told it was a "devastating injury" & we were able to see her. I just remember her lying on a table with the jagged wood, blood coming from her head. She underwent surgery & survived. She had many challenges, surgeries & fought to live.She had complications, but the trauma doctors told us that it would be 2 steps forward, 1 step back. I remember thinking & thanking God for every moment she lived. She even had to overcome MRSA. All of the meds caused an allergic reaction & her body was burning from the inside out. They combated brain swelling, adverse reactions to the most effective med for MRSA. My daught is an occupational therapist. As she was slowly awakened from the drug induced coma, she seemed to be using skills from her training as an OT. She was pulling her mitts off & was able to move her legs to kick off her leg wraps.At one point she had 1 leg over the bed railing trying to get up. With the drain in her head & trying to move, this miracle could have been tragic if she had pulled the drain.She woke up with her trach, & tried to mouth her thoughts. Her sisters brought a dry board & she wrote questions, comments. The doctors remained cautiously optimistic, we prayed for a miracle. I looked at my daughter & it's so hard to put into words what I feel. She survived. The nurses called her "a save". When I see her or talk to her I feel like I'm falling in love with her all over again. She has 2 seizures at home since her discharge, but her dosage has been bumped up & for now seems to be under control. I know I have PTSD but I can only talk to my husband & we both acknowledge & accept what we feel, but it's extremely difficult not to worry & be hypervigilant. Since the accident my concetration has declined, my anxities have increased. I look at my daughter with a look she sometimes finds upsetting. She wants to move on with her life & my anxities, I think relive the accident for her. Coming from the absolute brink of death, (she should not have lived said the nurses, she sustained such a catastrophic injury.they were amazed at her recovery)To come so close to losing my child has changed my life forever.
A great article and something that seems to be ignored, there can be nothing worse than to see your own child go through pain and suffering, I would not wish that on my own worst enemy.
There is so much we can do to reduce these injurys, but unfortunatly people usualy wait until an accident has happened before they put measures in to stop it, unintentional accidents in the home can be greatly reduced. These unintentional accident rates are also directly linked to the unintentional death rate in young children too. We are all responsible to try and stop unintentional accidents in the home, step up to the play and help stop these accidents and in turn reduce the unintentional death rate in children now thats a win win.