<p>The aim of this essay was to study children’s experiences of their participation in a programme for children who have a parent with a mental illness. The study was written at the request of the Psychosis care in Örebro and was accomplished by qualitative interviews with five children at the ages of 11 to 16 years old. Previous research concerning children who have a parent with a mental illness and programmes for these children is accounted for. Antonovsky´s conception KASAM together with the conceptions of guilt and shame were used as the theoretical frame, from which the results of the interviews were analysed. Results from the analysis include children’s increased knowledge about mental illness, an increased KASAM and that the children found it positive meeting other children with similar experiences. Overall, the experiences from the programme seem to be positive, but a few ideas for improvements are given, amongst them equal gender and ages in the group. Finally a discussion is held where increased knowledge and research concerning children with mentally ill parents is desired.</p>

<p>Background A lot of children live in families where a parent is suffering from some kind of mental illness. As nurses we have to notice these children, when we meet patients with mental illnes.</p><p>Aim The overall purpose of this study was to examine if and how the district/ psychiatric nurse acknowledge the child’s situation, when a parent is suffering from mental illness.</p><p>Method A qualitative approach was chosen for this study. Six psychiatric nurses and seven district nurses were interviewed. Content analysis was used for the analysis.</p><p>Result Four main themes appeard in the result: dialogs of different character, family focus, collaboration and report duty. The dialog differed depending on the purpose and depending on working with a family perspective. Regarding collaboration with other organizations, the nurses requested and got help in order to come further in working with the patients and their children. The duty to report was sometimes a problematic matter.</p><p>The conclusion was that all nurses agreed to the importance of acknowledging the children of families with mental illness. However there was a lack of well-functioning working methods of how to help these children. One proposal for further research is to develop evidence based methods family intervention programs.</p>

The aim of this essay was to study children’s experiences of their participation in a programme for children who have a parent with a mental illness. The study was written at the request of the Psychosis care in Örebro and was accomplished by qualitative interviews with five children at the ages of 11 to 16 years old. Previous research concerning children who have a parent with a mental illness and programmes for these children is accounted for. Antonovsky´s conception KASAM together with the conceptions of guilt and shame were used as the theoretical frame, from which the results of the interviews were analysed. Results from the analysis include children’s increased knowledge about mental illness, an increased KASAM and that the children found it positive meeting other children with similar experiences. Overall, the experiences from the programme seem to be positive, but a few ideas for improvements are given, amongst them equal gender and ages in the group. Finally a discussion is held where increased knowledge and research concerning children with mentally ill parents is desired.

Background A lot of children live in families where a parent is suffering from some kind of mental illness. As nurses we have to notice these children, when we meet patients with mental illnes. Aim The overall purpose of this study was to examine if and how the district/ psychiatric nurse acknowledge the child’s situation, when a parent is suffering from mental illness. Method A qualitative approach was chosen for this study. Six psychiatric nurses and seven district nurses were interviewed. Content analysis was used for the analysis. Result Four main themes appeard in the result: dialogs of different character, family focus, collaboration and report duty. The dialog differed depending on the purpose and depending on working with a family perspective. Regarding collaboration with other organizations, the nurses requested and got help in order to come further in working with the patients and their children. The duty to report was sometimes a problematic matter. The conclusion was that all nurses agreed to the importance of acknowledging the children of families with mental illness. However there was a lack of well-functioning working methods of how to help these children. One proposal for further research is to develop evidence based methods family intervention programs.

Bakgrund: Barn till en psykisk sjukförälder kan påverkas negativt av den psykiska sjukdomen. Vid bristande omsorg riskerar barnen att själva utveckla psykisk sjukdom i senare ålder. Studier visar att sjuksköterskor har svårigheter att möta dessa barn och ungdomar vars förälder har psykisk sjukdom. Syfte: Syftet var att beskriva barns upplevelser av att växa upp med en förälder som lider av psykisk sjukdom. Metod: Design för studien är en kvalitativ litteraturstudie med induktiv ansats baserad på sju självbiografier. Vid analys av data användes en manifest innehållsanalys. Resultat: Resultatet utmynnade i fyra kategorier; Att upprätthålla en fasad, att tvingas ta ansvar, att ha behov av stöd och att ha positiva minnen med tolv underkategorier. Trots en svår uppväxt med skam, ensamhet och avsaknad av stöd fanns det positiva minnen när barnen fick chans till en normal vardag. Samtliga barn beskrev att de önskade sig fått mer stöd från vården. Slutsats: Barn som lever med en psykiskt sjuk förälder upplevde de var tvungna att upprätthålla en fasad, tvingades ta ansvar och hade ett behov av att stöd. Med dessa upplevelser i åtanke behöver vården möta familjer där det finns psykiskt sjukdom närvarande med öppenhet.

<p>The aim of this undergraduate thesis was to study the experience of participation in support groups for children of mentally ill parents. The research questions dealt with how the children and the adolescents talked about the knowledge, that they believed having assimilated in the support groups. The knowledge concerned mental illness and the possible impact on children when having mentally ill parents. The research questions also dealt with how the children and the adolescents talked about the meaning of being in a group. Qualitative semi structured interviews were used in order to capture the respondents’ subjective experiences. As tools for analyzing the results, parts of the theories of Piaget and Antonovsky were applied. The results showed that the respondents experienced that they had learned about mental illness and that they had gotten different feelings explained and validated. Meeting other children of mentally ill parents and sharing experiences were some of the factors that the respondents claimed had made them feel less alone. A conclusion of the study was that the children and the adolescents have different cognitive possibilities to incorporate information about mental illness. This could help explain their somewhat different experiences of the support groups.</p>

The aim of this undergraduate thesis was to study the experience of participation in support groups for children of mentally ill parents. The research questions dealt with how the children and the adolescents talked about the knowledge, that they believed having assimilated in the support groups. The knowledge concerned mental illness and the possible impact on children when having mentally ill parents. The research questions also dealt with how the children and the adolescents talked about the meaning of being in a group. Qualitative semi structured interviews were used in order to capture the respondents’ subjective experiences. As tools for analyzing the results, parts of the theories of Piaget and Antonovsky were applied. The results showed that the respondents experienced that they had learned about mental illness and that they had gotten different feelings explained and validated. Meeting other children of mentally ill parents and sharing experiences were some of the factors that the respondents claimed had made them feel less alone. A conclusion of the study was that the children and the adolescents have different cognitive possibilities to incorporate information about mental illness. This could help explain their somewhat different experiences of the support groups.