• Sophie Geoghegan, Kate Oulton, Catherine Bull, Joe Brierley, Mark Peters, and Jo Wray.
• 1Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust, London, United Kingdom.2Institute of Child Health, University College London, London, United Kingdom.
• Pediatr Crit Care Me. 2016 Nov 1; 17 (11): e496-e501.

ObjectiveMeeting the needs of parents of critically ill children is increasingly being recognized as an important factor in the child's clinical outcome as well as the implications it has for future parenting. Little is specifically known about the experience of parents who have a child in the ICU for a prolonged period. Our objective was to understand the experiences of this group to assist in the identification of mechanisms for providing support.DesignQualitative study based on semistructured interviews. Data were analyzed using the Framework approach.SettingThe study took place in a tertiary pediatric hospital containing three ICUs: PICU, cardiac ICU, and neonatal ICU (ICU will be used to encompass neonatal ICU, cardiac ICU, and PICU for the remainder of the article).SubjectsSeventeen members of staff and 26 parents of a child who had a long stay in one of the three ICUs.InterventionsSemistructured, tape-recorded interviews.Measurements And Main ResultsAnalyses identified two overarching themes, "parent process" and "parent/staff interface," and six subthemes: adjustment, normalization/institutionalization, conflict, involvement in child's care, individualized care, and transition. Themes have been modeled to account for the parental process during a long stay in the ICU and the potential implications for the relationships and interactions between parents and staff. Findings are presented from the data related to the parent process and parent/staff interface. Inclusion of an element in the model related to staff indicates where support mechanisms should be focused.ConclusionsOver time, long-stay families will likely become more familiar with the environment of the ICU, more knowledgeable about their child's medical needs and more familiar with the staff looking after their child. This has a number of implications for staff working in the ICU.

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