Bereaved parents’ quality of life: resilience and professional support

Correspondence to Dr Omid Rasouli, Department of Public Health and Nursing, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway; [email protected]

Key messages

What was already known?

• Bereaved parents have low short-term QoL.

• Social support and resilience are important factors.

What are the new findings?

• Bereaved parents have lower long-term QoL than the control group.

• Better informational support and resilience are associated with higher QoL.

What is their significance?

• Clinical

  Improving resilience is helpful for long-term QoL in bereaved parents.

• Research

  Support should be tailored for individual needs.

Introduction

The loss of a child considerably changes parents’ lives and may cause an identity crisis with a loss of meaning in life.¹ The bereavement process is associated with higher risks of poor quality of life (QoL), depression, anxiety and prolonged grief in cancer-bereaved parents.² QoL is often defined as the concept that incorporates physical functioning, mental status and a person’s ability to engage in social activities.³ Previous research has mainly investigated QoL in cancer survivors, patients with cancer and their caregivers.⁴ Lower short-term QoL has been found in bereaved family members of patients with cancer compared with controls.^{5 6} However, there has been little research investigating QoL among cancer-bereaved parents in a long-term perspective compared with control parents.⁷

Although it is important to reduce risk factors during stressful life events, it is also essential to focus on factors such as resilience that can protect individuals’ QoL and increase the likelihood of positive outcomes.⁸ The growing interest in resilience and its impact on QoL is primarily motivated by identifying which protective factors and mechanisms promote healthy adjustment after exposure to significant life stressors.⁹ Resilience refers to ‘a dynamic process encompassing positive adaptation within the context of significant adversity’.¹⁰ Resilience was found to be an important moderator of pain and stress, supporting a protective effect of resilience.¹¹ However, to our knowledge, the protective role of resilience on long-term QoL is unclear among cancer-bereaved parents.

In general, both positive and negative circumstances regarding end-of-life and follow-up care influence parents’ ability to return to everyday life and resume their routines.¹² ‘Social support’ is an important resilience factor that can protect and prevent adverse outcomes in the face of difficulty.^13...