[Personal experience of children with a brain injured parent: preliminary study]

To explore the impact of the brain injury of a parent on his child's behavioural and emotional symptoms and personal experience.

Nineteen children from 6 to 12 years old at the time of the research having a brain-injured parent living at home and with cognitive impairments.

Case report. Assessment of a questionnaire measures of anxiety, the R-CMAS scale. Qualitative analysis of a semi-structured interview and of the family drawing.

Four children (21%) presented pathological anxiety assessed by the R-CMAS scale. The analysis of the semi-structured interview showed that 16 children had a representation of the brain injury. The symbolic place of the brain-injured parent was maintained for all the children and one presented impulsive behaviours. The family drawing analysis showed the lack of relational interaction between the family members in 16 cases (84%). Three children (15%) represented the real disability, and 17 (89%) abnormalities in the bodies' pictorial representation of the personages. These abnormalities concerned the brain-injured parent and the other members of the family. A characteristic sign was the lack of hands or the representation of amputee hands in 14 cases (73%). Another one was the unsteadiness of family members, who were also represented as ghosts or "in the air" in 13 cases (68%).

Children seem adapted and they have few emotional and behavioural disorders. But there was a strong impact of the disability of the parent on their personal experience and on their perception of "the family body".