Effectiveness of Supportive Psychoeducational Program on Burden and feeling of hopelessness among Family Caregivers of Children with Down Syndrome

Abstract

Caregivers of children with disabilities are exposed to burdens with subjective and objective dimensions. The subjective burden depends upon how the caregiver perceives the burden of care and may be felt strongly by one person and not at all by another. The objective burden includes consequences of the caregiving tasks on the caregivers’ economic resources, household activities, health, and leisure. Therefore, this study aimed at assessing the effect supportive psychoeducational program on burden and feeling of hopelessness among family caregivers of children with down syndrome. A quasi-experimental design was selected for this study. The sample consisted of sixty-two family caregivers of children with down syndrome. Three tools of data collection were used in this study: (1) A structured interviewing questionnaire sheet, (2) Family Burden Evaluation Scale (FBES), and (3) Beck Hopelessness Scale (BHS). The main results showed that, there was significant reduction on mean score regarding domain of hopelessness in the post-program implementation phase compared to the preprogram phase, including felling about the future, loss of motivation and future expectation & there was highly statistically significant improvement in all subscales of burden among the family caregiver at post program than preprogram. Conclusion: the result of this study supported hypothesis of psychoeducational program for families caring children with down syndrome have appositive effect on reduce feeling of hopelessness and minimize level of burden. This study recommended that, designing training program for caregivers regarding coping patterns for their roles to their children with down syndrome and provision a guideline booklet to all newly admitted mothers having children with DS in Genic clinic and rehabilitation center to help them in improving their knowledge and practices.