Mindfulness for Mothers of Children With Disabilities

Caregiver Burnout Clinical Trial

Official title:

Mindfulness-Based Online Support Program for Mothers of Children With Disabilities

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT05620368
• Other study ID #: 01/2021
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: October 1, 2021
• Est. completion date: February 28, 2023

Study information

• Verified date: December 2022
• Source: Wroclaw University of Health and Sport Sciences
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

The main objective of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an eight-week mindfulness-based teleintervention in improving quality of life, parental burnout, self-compassion, and stress level in mothers of children with disabilities.

Description:

Parenthood is accompanied by significant mental and physical effort accompanied by different sources of long-term stress and encumbrance. The results of this research indicate serious difficulties in the functioning of parents of children with disabilities, such as pain, emotional and physical discomfort, anxiety, depression, and problems resulting from the realization of everyday life activities combined with the care of the child. They indicate how serious this crisis is and how important life constraints it brings to the individual and the social functioning of the family.

A parent's ability to adapt to stressful situations depends on several variables, including an individual's psychological strengths, individual and family resources, and the type of coping strategies utilized. Parental burnout is defined as a syndrome that occurs in response to chronic parental stress. The risk of parental burnout is related to family functioning. In the concept of family as an interactional system, "family adaptability is the degree to which the family is flexible and can regain equilibrium in stressful and challenging situations or environments".

Positive coping styles such as positive perceptions and effective problem-solving skills were associated with successful family adaptation and resilience. Twenty years ago, the concept of mindful parenting was introduced as an alternative to traditional discipline-oriented methods by focusing on the quality of a parent's presence in the parent-child dyad. It focuses on cultivating mindfulness and attunement with the parent's inner experience while interacting with the child, and feeling the full range of emotions related to parenting. Mindful parenting involves cultivating non-judgmental awareness of the unfolding of internal and external experiences in daily life, practicing emotion regulation skills, learning about adaptive responses to distress, and developing a self-compassionate attitude toward one's fallibility, limitations, and suffering.

Compassion- and mindfulness-based interventions (CMBIs) hold promise in supporting parental resilience by enabling adaptive stress appraisal and coping, mindful parenting, and self-compassion. These interventions also aimed to reduce social isolation by increasing the capacity for connections. Perceived social support, an aspect of compassionate behavior, is a potent buffer against stress on health outcomes.

Therefore, the main objective of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an eight-week mindfulness-based teleintervention in improving quality of life, parental burnout, self-compassion, and stress level in mothers of children with disabilities. The investigators hypothesize that the mindfulness-based teleintervention compared with the control group will lead to (A) an improvement in positive aspects of mental health, including quality of life, and self-compassion, and (B) a reduction in psychopathological variables including perceived stress and parental burnout.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 24
• Est. completion date: February 28, 2023
• Est. primary completion date: January 30, 2023
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: Female
• Age group: N/A and older

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• mother of childern with disabilities

Exclusion Criteria:

• substance abuse;

• participation in another therapeutic project or individual psychotherapy;

• antidepressant treatment.

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Burnout, Psychological
• Caregiver Burden
• Caregiver Burnout
• Parental Burnout

Intervention

Behavioral:
• Mindfulness and Compassionate Living Course (MCLC)
The course will be held online (using the Zoom platform) with weekly sessions lasting 2.5 hours each, as well as a day of silent practice (mini-retreat of 4 hours) between sessions 6 and 7. On the structural level, every course session consists of four elements: (1) an educational input, (2) mindfulness and compassion exercises (eg, sitting meditation, body scan, mindful walking, self-compassion break), (3) a reflection of one's practice (inquiry), (4) and home assignments.
• Usual care intervention
If necessary, psychological support is organized at the request of the parent. Support includes individual support of a psychologist (1h / week), consultation with a teacher (special pedagogue and early school education teacher, 1h / week), individual consultation with observation of a child with a Venetian mirror (1h / week).

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
Poland	Jan Dlugosz University in Czestochowa	Czestochowa	Upper Silesia
Poland	University of Silesia in Katowice	Katowice	Upper Silesi
Poland	Wroclaw University of Health and Sport Sciences	Wroclaw	Lower Silesia

Sponsors (3)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
Wroclaw University of Health and Sport Sciences	Jan Dlugosz University in Czestochowa, University of Silesia in Katowice

Country where clinical trial is conducted

Poland, 

References & Publications (16)

Allen AB, Leary MR. Self-Compassion, Stress, and Coping. Soc Personal Psychol Compass. 2010 Feb 1;4(2):107-118. doi: 10.1111/j.1751-9004.2009.00246.x. — View Citation

Bogels SM, Lehtonen A, Restifo K. Mindful Parenting in Mental Health Care. Mindfulness (N Y). 2010 Jun;1(2):107-120. doi: 10.1007/s12671-010-0014-5. Epub 2010 May 25. — View Citation

Bohadana G, Morrissey S, Paynter J. Self-Compassion in Mothers of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Qualitative Analysis. J Autism Dev Disord. 2021 Apr;51(4):1290-1303. doi: 10.1007/s10803-020-04612-2. — View Citation

Bohadana G, Morrissey S, Paynter J. Self-compassion: A Novel Predictor of Stress and Quality of Life in Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord. 2019 Oct;49(10):4039-4052. doi: 10.1007/s10803-019-04121-x. — View Citation

Cousineau TM, Hobbs LM, Arthur KC. The Role of Compassion and Mindfulness in Building Parental Resilience When Caring for Children With Chronic Conditions: A Conceptual Model. Front Psychol. 2019 Aug 5;10:1602. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01602. eCollection 2019. — View Citation

Duncan LG, Coatsworth JD, Greenberg MT. A model of mindful parenting: implications for parent-child relationships and prevention research. Clin Child Fam Psychol Rev. 2009 Sep;12(3):255-70. doi: 10.1007/s10567-009-0046-3. — View Citation

Ettman CK, Abdalla SM, Cohen GH, Sampson L, Vivier PM, Galea S. Prevalence of Depression Symptoms in US Adults Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic. JAMA Netw Open. 2020 Sep 1;3(9):e2019686. doi: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.19686. — View Citation

Friis AM, Johnson MH, Cutfield RG, Consedine NS. Kindness Matters: A Randomized Controlled Trial of a Mindful Self-Compassion Intervention Improves Depression, Distress, and HbA1c Among Patients With Diabetes. Diabetes Care. 2016 Nov;39(11):1963-1971. doi: 10.2337/dc16-0416. Epub 2016 Jun 22. — View Citation

Homan KJ, Sirois FM. Self-compassion and physical health: Exploring the roles of perceived stress and health-promoting behaviors. Health Psychol Open. 2017 Sep 14;4(2):2055102917729542. doi: 10.1177/2055102917729542. eCollection 2017 Jul-Dec. — View Citation

Kuhlthau KA, Luberto CM, Traeger L, Millstein RA, Perez GK, Lindly OJ, Chad-Friedman E, Proszynski J, Park ER. A Virtual Resiliency Intervention for Parents of Children with Autism: A Randomized Pilot Trial. J Autism Dev Disord. 2020 Jul;50(7):2513-2526. doi: 10.1007/s10803-019-03976-4. — View Citation

Neece CL, Chan N, Klein K, Roberts L, Fenning RM. Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction for Parents of Children with Developmental Delays: Understanding the Experiences of Latino Families. Mindfulness (N Y). 2019 Jun;10(6):1017-1030. doi: 10.1007/s12671-018-1011-3. Epub 2018 Sep 6. — View Citation

Robinson S, Hastings RP, Weiss JA, Pagavathsing J, Lunsky Y. Self-compassion and psychological distress in parents of young people and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. J Appl Res Intellect Disabil. 2018 May;31(3):454-458. doi: 10.1111/jar.12423. Epub 2017 Nov 9. — View Citation

Ten Hoopen LW, de Nijs PFA, Duvekot J, Greaves-Lord K, Hillegers MHJ, Brouwer WBF, Hakkaart-van Roijen L. Children with an Autism Spectrum Disorder and Their Caregivers: Capturing Health-Related and Care-Related Quality of Life. J Autism Dev Disord. 2020 Jan;50(1):263-277. doi: 10.1007/s10803-019-04249-w. — View Citation

Turnage D, Conner N. Quality of life of parents of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: An integrative literature review. J Spec Pediatr Nurs. 2022 Oct;27(4):e12391. doi: 10.1111/jspn.12391. Epub 2022 Aug 20. — View Citation

Wang H, Wang Q, Hu X, Han ZR. Mindfulness and Stress Among Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder in China. J Autism Dev Disord. 2022 May;52(5):2035-2045. doi: 10.1007/s10803-021-05011-x. Epub 2021 May 29. — View Citation

Zessin U, Dickhauser O, Garbade S. The Relationship Between Self-Compassion and Well-Being: A Meta-Analysis. Appl Psychol Health Well Being. 2015 Nov;7(3):340-64. doi: 10.1111/aphw.12051. Epub 2015 Aug 26. — View Citation

* Note: There are 16 references in all — Click here to view all references

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Families in Early Intervention Quality of Life (FEIQoL)	Families in Early Intervention Quality of Life (FEIQoL) questionnaire will be used for assessing the quality of life. Participants answer 40 items using a five-point Likert scale (1, 'poor' to 5, 'excellent') in the aspects of family life (24 items), and child's functioning (16 items).	15 minutes
Secondary	Parental Burnout Measure (PBM-12)	Parental Burnout will be assessed with the Parental Burnout Measure (PBM-12) measures parental burnout in two dimensions: exhaustion and helplessness. Both dimensions are measured as a sum of 6 items, answered on a 4-point Likert scale (1, 'never' to 4, 'very often'). Fully satisfactory internal reliability indicators (Cronbach's alpha) were reached by all burnout measures - PBM-12 total score (.90), exhaustion subscale (.88), and helplessness sub-scale (.80).	7 minutes
Secondary	Self-Compassion Scale (SCS)	To assess self-compassion we will use a polish adaptation of the Self-Compassion Scale (SCS). Items on the SCS use a five-point Likert scale to measure conformity (1, 'almost never' to 5, 'almost always'). The final SCS score ranges from 26 to 130. A higher score indicates a higher level of self-compassion. This scale has good internal consistency and test-retest reliability (.93).	7 minutes
Secondary	Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10)	The 10-item Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10) will be used to measure self-reported stress. This scale includes 10 questions, with answers ranked using a 5-point Likert scale, and assesses stressful experiences and responses to stress over the previous 4 weeks. Scores range from 0 to 56, with higher scores indicating higher levels of perceived stress.	7 minutes
Secondary	Ego Resilience Scale (ER89)	The Ego-Resiliency Scale (ER89) measures the construct of ego-resiliency, which refers to the dynamic capacity of an individual to modify a characteristic level of ego-control, in either direction, as a function of the demand characteristics of the environmental context, so as to preserve or enhance system equilibration. It consists of 14 items, each responded to on a 4-point scale (1 = "does not apply at all"; 2 = "applies slightly, if at all"; 3 = "applies somewhat"; and 4 = "applies very strongly").	7 minutes