Stress of custodians of disabled children who attend Special Education Center of the Central Region, Bangkok.

Abstract

Background : Disabled children are a cause of stress in family, especially to custodians who are the closest and have most important roles for caring children with disabilities. However, stress in custodians with disabled children that attend at Special Education Center of the Central Region, Bangkok has not been studied.

Objective : To study the stress and associated factors of custodians with disabled children who attend Special Education Center of the Central Region, Bangkok.

Design : cross-sectional descriptive study

Setting : Special Education of the Center region , Bangkok

Materials and Methods : Study population were 118 custodians of disabled children. The research instruments were: demographic questionnaire, social support questionnaire, and custodian stress test. The relationship between the custodians’ stress level and associated factors were analysed using chi-square test. Logistic regression was used to identify the predictors of stress in custodians of disabled children. A p-value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results : Most custodians of disabled children who attended Special Education Center were female (88.1%) with the average age of 40.7 ± 8.9 years. About half of the custodians (52.6%) had the high-to-highest level of stress. Associated factors of custodians’ stress included custodians’ financial status, educational level, occupation, perception of the severity of disability of the child, and social supporting (p <0.05). After performing logistic regression, the remaining predictors of highto- highest level of stress were custodians’ educational level, occupation, financial status and perception of the severity of disability of the child.

Conclusion : About half of the custodians had high-to-highest level of stress. The predictors of high-to-highest level of stress were custodians’ educational level, occupation, financial status and perception of the severity of disability of the child. The result of this study will be information for relevant officials to plan and encourage custodians with disabled children to be aware and manage their stress appropriately. This might be beneficial for good mental health and effect on the efficient nurture of the disabled child.