Parent-Child Communication About Cancer

描述（由申请人提供）：这是一个竞争性的续期申请，用于进行理论驱动的研究，以确定癌症儿童及其父母队列中心理健康，社会和身体健康结果的过程和预测因素。我们一直在跟踪258名儿童（进入研究时年龄为5至17岁）的样本，从他们确诊癌症的时间开始，到确诊后的第一年，他们的留存率非常高。到本补助期结束时，我们将收集3波数据，包括观察，访谈和问卷调查，我们现在建议收集另外2波数据，包括诊断后长达5年的亲子互动的直接观察。 孩子和他们的父母完成了关于癌症相关压力来源的测量，他们如何科普癌症，痛苦和心理健康问题的标准化指标，他们参加了视频记录的观察。我们建议将这项工作扩展到研究从治疗到生存的过渡。我们的目标是：1）检查关于癌症的亲子沟通的连续性和变化; 2）确定癌症儿童及其父母后期心理和身体健康结果的早期预测因素; 3）检查父母和孩子应对，心理和身体健康之间的相互关系。为了实现这些目标，我们建议收集间隔12个月的另外两波访谈，观察和多代理问卷数据。该项目旨在确定风险和保护因素及程序，可用于建立一个理论驱动的应对和适应儿童癌症的模式，并确定未来对癌症儿童及其父母进行早期预防性心理社会干预的目标。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This is a competing renewal application to conduct theoretically-driven research to determine the course and predictors of mental health, social, and physical health outcomes in a cohort of children with cancer and their parents. We have been following a sample of 258 children (ages 5 to 17-years at entry into the study) from near the time of their cancer diagnosis over the first year after their diagnosis with a very high retention rate. By the end of this grant period we will have collected 3 waves of data including observations, interviews and questionnaires and we now propose to collect 2 additional waves of data, including direct observations of parent-child interactions, up to 5 years after diagnosis. Child and their parents completed measures about sources of cancer-related stress, how they cope with cancer, standardized indicators of distress and mental health problems, and they participated in video recorded observations. We propose to extend this work to examine the transition off treatment and into survivorship. Our aims are: 1) To examine continuity and change in parent-child communication about cancer; 2) To identify early predictors of later mental and physical health outcomes for children with cancer and their parents; and 3) To examine reciprocal relationships between parent and child coping, mental and physical health. To meet these aims, we propose to collect 2 additional waves of interview, observational and multi-agent questionnaire data spaced 12 months apart. The project is designed to identify risk and protective factors and processes that can be used to establish a theory-driven model of coping and adaptation to childhood cancer and to identify targets for the future early preventive psychosocial interventions with children with cancer and their parents.