Pediatric Intensive Care Units (PICUs) are units that have the necessary technical equipment and materials in order to maintain the life, care and treatment of children aged 1 month to 18 years who are in need of medical care, with one or more organ failure, and to prevent possible complications. It differs from other pediatric services where professional nursing care is provided with close follow-up and treatment.
Diseases admitted to the PICU include sepsis, status epilepticus, Central Nervous System infection, hepatic coma, animal bites/stings, traumas, intracranial hemorrhage, suffocation, electric shock, and meningococcemia, with the most common pulmonary infection being the most common. Hospitalization of the child for reasons such as illness, accident or injury can cause significant changes in almost the entire life of the family and cause anxiety. The fact that children's illnesses and injuries require hospitalization in intensive care makes the stress more traumatic. Being a member of the intensive care team, nurses, being aware of the stress sources of the parents whose children are hospitalized in the PICU and knowing their reactions can help them to cope with this situation.
There are no professional home care teams in our country to provide home care for children with special needs dependent on medical devices. Therefore, the care needs of these patients are met by their families after discharge. During the rehabilitation process of children with special care needs, the family may have to perform the duties of health professionals such as administering medication or oxygen therapy in general, performing routine maintenance and replacing tracheostomy tubes, maintaining airway patency, maintaining and replacing nasogastric tubes. After discharge, doing these cares takes a large part of the parents' attention, time and costs. It can cause stress, anxiety, and fear. Another factor affecting the anxiety levels of families after discharge is that they do not feel adequately equipped and educated for their children's care at home (aspiration, mechanical ventilator support, etc.), they do not know what to do in an emergency, they do not receive home health care services or they cannot reach enough. These are situations such as fear of being harmed at home because they think that their children are more sensitive and prone to getting sick than other children.
There are factors that prevent parents with special needs children from coping with the negative emotions they experience while raising their children, and one of them is their hope-level cognition and sensory status. This situation may be the factors that turn his daily life into anxiety and reinforce his hopelessness. Parents need to receive some training from nurses in order to fully care for their children who need special care. It is necessary to inform parents about the development of their child's self-care skills, to increase their ability to manage stress and to solve problems, and to encourage parents with the educational content prepared by determining the functions that the child needs care for.
