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Parental Problem-Solving Abilities and the Association of Sickle Cell Disease Complications with Health-Related Quality of Life for School-Age Children

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Abstract

Children with sickle cell disease (SCD) are at risk for poor health-related quality of life (HRQOL). The current analysis sought to explore parent problem-solving abilities/skills as a moderator between SCD complications and HRQOL to evaluate applicability to pediatric SCD. At baseline, 83 children ages 6–12 years and their primary caregiver completed measures of child HRQOL. Primary caregivers also completed a measure of social problem-solving. A SCD complications score was computed from medical record review. Parent problem-solving abilities significantly moderated the association of SCD complications with child self-report psychosocial HRQOL (p = .006). SCD complications had a direct effect on parent proxy physical and psychosocial child HRQOL. Enhancing parent problem-solving abilities may be one approach to improve HRQOL for children with high SCD complications; however, modification of parent perceptions of HRQOL may require direct intervention to improve knowledge and skills involved in disease management.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by a grant from NHLBI (U54 HL070585) to Lamia P. Barakat (PI).

Conflict of interest

Lamia P. Barakat, Lauren C. Daniel, Kelsey Smith, M. Renée Robinson, and Chavis A. Patterson declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical standard

All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional and national) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent/permission was obtained from all parent participants and child assent from patient participants for being included in the study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Oncology, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, 3501 Civic Center Blvd., 10303 CTRB, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA

    Lamia P. Barakat & Lauren C. Daniel

  2. Department of Pediatrics, Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Lamia P. Barakat

  3. Department of Psychology, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA

    Kelsey Smith

  4. Division of Hematology/Oncology, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children, Drexel University College of Medicine, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    M. Renée Robinson

  5. Division of Neonatology, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Chavis A. Patterson

  6. Department of Psychiatry, Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Chavis A. Patterson

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  1. Lamia P. Barakat
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  2. Lauren C. Daniel
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  3. Kelsey Smith
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  4. M. Renée Robinson
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  5. Chavis A. Patterson
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Correspondence to Lamia P. Barakat.

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Barakat, L.P., Daniel, L.C., Smith, K. et al. Parental Problem-Solving Abilities and the Association of Sickle Cell Disease Complications with Health-Related Quality of Life for School-Age Children. J Clin Psychol Med Settings 21, 56–65 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10880-013-9379-7

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