Predictors of parental adjustment to children's epilepsy in rural India

Negative societal attitudes towards disability affect the adjustment of parents when their child is diagnosed with epilepsy. Recent studies have suggested that parental and child outcomes, including adjustment, can be influenced by non-directed social support to mothers of children with disability. The objective of our study was to test the hypothesis that maternal satisfaction with social support, measured at the beginning of treatment, would predict parental adjustment to the child's epilepsy after 1 year of treatment.

We enrolled 46 mothers of children aged 6-18 years with epilepsy in the study. We measured social support using the modified Dunst family support scale, and parental adjustment using a locally validated instrument (S-PAM). Correlation was tested using a multiple linear regression model, allowing for confounding variables.

Parental adjustment at outcome was positively independently correlated with satisfaction with social support at baseline,and negatively with severity of the child's epilepsy. The regression model explained 34% of the total variance.

Taken together with evidence from previous studies, this finding supports the idea that helping parents to find more satisfaction within their (new or existing) social networks will promote adjustment to their child's disability.