The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health well-being among parents of children with disabilities and without disabilities

ABSTRACT

The outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic had raised enormous threat in social, economy, health and environment globally. This study aims to identify the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health well-being among parents of children with disabilities and without disabilities. A cross-sectional study was employed, with a total of 150 parents. The tools used are Demographic Form, Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) and Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10). Data analysis depicts that most of the parents have normal level of depression, anxiety and stress with value of 53.8%, 46.2%, 64.1% in parents of children with disabilities, and 72.2%, 58.3%, 84.7% for parents of children without disabilities. However, the parents show moderate level of perceived stress with value of 67.9% and 52.8% in parents of children with disabilities and without disabilities. The difference in mental health well-being (depression (Mean=4.92, 3.54, SD=4.10, 3.25), stress (Mean=6.63, 5.17, SD=4.09, 3.78) and perceived stress (Mean=17.40, 14.63, SD= 6.87, 5.44)) among both parents are significant (p0.05). While, the mean difference for parents of children with disability is the highest. There is significant correlation between depression with type of child s disability, between stress with gender and age, as well as between perceived stress symptoms with marital status and employment status. We can conclude that the mental health well-being of parents of children with disabilities are more affected compared to parents of children without disabilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, the type of child s disability (mental and physical), gender (female) employment status (working), marital status (married) and age (below 40 years old) are significant predictor to deterioration of mental health well-being among both parents. Implications offer research-based data for policymakers to create suitable and successful initiatives for parents of disabled children during COVID-19 pandemic. © 2021 Teikyo University School of Medicine. All rights reserved.