TY - JOUR
T1 - Cause of death of infants and children in the intensive care unit
T2 - Parents' recall vs chart review
AU - Brooten, Dorothy
AU - Youngblut, Jo Anne M.
AU - Caicedo, Carmen
AU - Seagrave, Lynn
AU - Patricia Cantwell, G.
AU - Totapally, Balagangadhar
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 American Association of Critical-Care Nurses.
PY - 2016/5/1
Y1 - 2016/5/1
N2 - Background More than 55 000 children die annually in the United States, most in neonatal and pediatric intensive care units. Because of the stress and emotional turmoil of the deaths, the children's parents have difficulty comprehending information. Objectives To compare parents' reports and hospital chart data on cause of death and examine agreement on cause of death according to parents' sex, race, participation in end-of-life decisions, and discussion with physicians; deceased child's age, unit of care (neonatal or pediatric); and hospital and intensive care unit lengths of stay. Methods A descriptive, correlational design was used with a structured interview of parents 1 month after the death and review of hospital chart data. Parents whose children died in intensive care were recruited from 4 South Florida hospitals and from Florida Department of Health death records. Results Among 230 parents, 54% of mothers and 40% of fathers agreed with the chart cause of death. Agreement did not differ significantly for mothers or fathers by race/ ethnicity, participation in end-of-life decisions, discussions with physicians, or mean length of hospital stay. Agreement was better for mothers when the stay in the intensive care unit was the shortest. Fathers' agreement with chart data was best when the deceased was an infant and death was in the pediatric intensive care unit. Conclusions Death of a child is a time of high stress when parents' concentration, hearing, and information processing are diminished. Many parents have misconceptions about the cause of the death 1 month after the death. (American Journal of Critical Care. 2016;25:235-242).
AB - Background More than 55 000 children die annually in the United States, most in neonatal and pediatric intensive care units. Because of the stress and emotional turmoil of the deaths, the children's parents have difficulty comprehending information. Objectives To compare parents' reports and hospital chart data on cause of death and examine agreement on cause of death according to parents' sex, race, participation in end-of-life decisions, and discussion with physicians; deceased child's age, unit of care (neonatal or pediatric); and hospital and intensive care unit lengths of stay. Methods A descriptive, correlational design was used with a structured interview of parents 1 month after the death and review of hospital chart data. Parents whose children died in intensive care were recruited from 4 South Florida hospitals and from Florida Department of Health death records. Results Among 230 parents, 54% of mothers and 40% of fathers agreed with the chart cause of death. Agreement did not differ significantly for mothers or fathers by race/ ethnicity, participation in end-of-life decisions, discussions with physicians, or mean length of hospital stay. Agreement was better for mothers when the stay in the intensive care unit was the shortest. Fathers' agreement with chart data was best when the deceased was an infant and death was in the pediatric intensive care unit. Conclusions Death of a child is a time of high stress when parents' concentration, hearing, and information processing are diminished. Many parents have misconceptions about the cause of the death 1 month after the death. (American Journal of Critical Care. 2016;25:235-242).
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84973369311&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84973369311&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.4037/ajcc2016233
DO - 10.4037/ajcc2016233
M3 - Article
C2 - 27134230
AN - SCOPUS:84973369311
VL - 25
SP - 235
EP - 242
JO - American Journal of Critical Care
JF - American Journal of Critical Care
SN - 1062-3264
IS - 3
ER -