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Journal of Pediatric Psychology Advance Access originally published online on February 23, 2005
Journal of Pediatric Psychology 2005 30(7):623-628; doi:10.1093/jpepsy/jsi048
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Journal of Pediatric Psychology vol. 30 no. 7 © Society of Pediatric Psychology 2005; all rights reserved.

When Distraction Fails: Parental Anxiety and Children’s Responses to Distraction during Cancer Procedures

Lynnda M. Dahlquist, PhD1 and Jennifer Shroff Pendley, PhD2

1 Department of Psychology, University of Maryland Baltimore County, and 2 Division of Behavioral Health, A. I duPont Hospital for Children

All correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Lynnda M. Dahlquist, Department of Psychology, UMBC, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, Maryland 21250. E-mail: dahlquis{at}umbc.edu.

Received February 13, 2004; revisions received June 24, 2004 and August 13, 2004; accepted August 15, 2004

Objective To examine parental anxiety in the context of successful and unsuccessful distraction treatment of preschool aged children undergoing chemotherapy procedures. Methods Twenty-nine children (M age = 42 months) experiencing intramuscular or portacatheter injections participated in the study. Parents and children were shown how to use a portable electronic toy as a distractor during chemotherapy injections. Parental anxiety was assessed at baseline and child distress was coded during each procedure. Results Parents’ baseline state anxiety accounted for 17% of the variance in changes in children’s distress following distraction intervention. Parents of children who did not benefit from distraction reported significantly higher state anxiety at baseline than parents of the other participants. Conclusions Results highlight the importance of examining individual outcomes in intervention studies and suggest that parents’ emotional states may moderate distraction treatment outcome in young children. Future research formally testing parent anxiety as a moderator is recommended.

Key words: children; distraction; parents; anxiety; distress; medical procedures.


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