A Father’s Perspective on Caring for a Chronically Ill Child
An international team of nurses explores the father's experience of caring for a child with a chronic illness.
When a child is born, the number one concern of mothers and fathers is the health of the child. From that moment on, parents worry about keeping their children safe and do everything they can to keep their children healthy. But what happens when a child is diagnosed with a chronic illness? Unfortunately, the occurrence of chronic illness in children is increasing around the world and parents are required to manage complex medical challenges and multiple therapies.
A team of nurses recognized that research has documented the experiences of mothers caring for a child with chronic illness; however, they noticed little is known about the experiences of fathers. Based on this information, the international team led by University of Saskatchewan (USask) College of Nursing associate professor Dr. Shelley Spurr (PhD) and Dr. Cynthia Danford (PhD) (University of Pittsburgh School of Nursing) will look at the fathers’ experience when caring for a child with a chronic illness.
“Our team is passionate about family nursing,” said Dr. Spurr. “We hope the research we are doing will ultimately benefit nurses from the across the world who can use our findings to improve the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of current family nursing practice, in respect to families caring for chronically ill children.”
The project brings together 21 researchers from five countries, all whom belong to the International Family Nursing Association (IFNA). “We started this project in Spring 2020 by forming a pediatric research cluster within the IFNA and that group has been working on phase one of the project,” said Dr. Spurr. “We are currently conducting a systematic review to gather the literature related to fathers’ experiences and engagement in caring for their child with a chronic illness. The review will identify the facilitators and barriers to fathers’ participation in care, which will expand the overall family perspective.”
Dr. Spurr anticipates the systematic review part of this project will be complete Winter 2022. The team hopes to present the findings of this research through conferences and webinars and publish in a peer-reviewed journal by Spring 2022.
This project has received funding from the International Family Nursing Association and Minnesota State University, Glen Taylor Nursing Institute for Family & Society.