How does chronic illness affect families?

Some studies suggest that having a child with a chronic illness has a negative impact on the relationship, including lack of time with the spouse, communication problems, higher divorce rates, increased relationship conflict, increased role strain, and decreased relationship satisfaction.

How does illness affect family functioning?

Illness in a family member tends to raise the anxiety of all those close to the patient. Anxiety may be misinterpreted by the health professional as lack of interest or as reluctance to provide the patient with help and support.

What effect does chronic illness have on relationships?

They may lose intimacy with their ill partner, whose focus on illness necessitates less attention to the relationship. They may lose prior ways of being together in relationship, as symptoms limit activity types and levels. They may lose social connectedness with others, as illness requires more of a home-bound life.

How do you deal with a chronically ill family member?

Managing the emotional challenges of chronic illness

1. Accept that your life has changed. Try not to hold onto the way things were.
2. Take time for yourself. Caregiving is a demanding job, whether you are doing it full-time or only on evenings and weekends.
3. Make time for other family members.
4. Ask for help when you need it.

What are chronic health problems?

Chronic diseases are defined broadly as conditions that last 1 year or more and require ongoing medical attention or limit activities of daily living or both. Chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer, and diabetes are the leading causes of death and disability in the United States.

When a parent has a chronic illness?

In this age group having a parent with a chronic illness increases the risk of poor social and behavioural functioning, academic underachievement, and higher rates of internalizing and externalizing problems. Research on younger children has provided mixed results.

How does chronic illness impact on social interaction?

People who are hampered by a chronic illness are more likely to experience feelings of depression, which may reduce their ability to maintain informal social contacts. 2. The negative relationship between chronic illness and informal social capital can be (partly) explained by (feelings of) depression.

How does illness affect the family?

Article Body. The stress of a serious illness, chronic health condition or disability in a child often causes problems in a family, particularly if each parent or adult caregiver attempts to deal with his or her own fears and frustrations related to the chronic health condition or disability alone and without support.

Can a family thrive with a child with a chronic illness?

However, families can also thrive as they embrace and love a child with a chronic illness or disability. A child with health problems may bring parents and other family members closer.

How does chronic illness affect the individual?

Chronic Illness and the Individual According to Boice (1998) chronic illnesses can magnify developmental issues, increase the desire to be socially accepted, and cause children and adolescents with a chronic illness to spend significantly more time in isolation than their peers. Children

How does having a child with a chronic illness affect marriage?

Some studies suggest that having a child with a chronic illness has a negative impact on the relationship, including lack of time with the spouse , com munication problems, higher divorce rates, increased relationship conflict, increased role strain, and decreased relationship satisfaction.