Evaluate at the psychosocial level, the experience of parents of children with cerebral palsy in Abidjan (RCI).
Analytical multicenter cross-sectional study carried out over 3 months (April-June 2021) from a sample of 246 biological parents or non-parents of children followed for cerebral palsy. Scales used: Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and Family Impact of Childhood Disability scale.
Parents aged between 30 and 40 (44.3 %), living with a partner (n = 190) and attending school in 81.7 % of cases. The mean score of the positive FICD items was 14.5 out of 10 and that of the negative items was 20 out of 40, reflecting the presence of symptoms of anxiety and depression in 25 cases (10.3 %) and 22 cases (9 %) respectively in parents. The severity of children's motor impairments was associated with the occurrence of anxiety among parents (P = 0.01) despite their religious faith (P = 0.03). There was no significant association between the children's clinical and sociodemographic parameters, the parents’ religious faith and the parents’ onset of depression (P > 0.05).
Childhood CP had an impact on parents’ psychosocial experiences. This impact was associated with the severity of the child's motor impairment, but the social and economic discomfort was independent of the parents’ social and cultural background and family beliefs and ties. Psychological support for parents of children with CP should not be ignored in the follow-up of these children.
People with cerebral palsy experience frequent and complex pain situations. The co-occurrence of acute and chronic pain increases complexity. To provide an appropriate response, the challenge is to identify the type of pain experienced at a given moment when assessing pain. To understand a subject's unique experience of pain, it may be necessary to adopt a bio-psycho-social model, which considers the mutual interactions between factors of different natures. Recent scientific literature emphasizes the facilitating role that interoceptive sensitivity can play in identifying the specific characteristics of a painful experience. It seems that interoceptive awareness development occurs at an early stage, based on the child's verbal exchanges with those around him. As a result, body-psychological approaches to the development of interoceptive awareness could be advantageously included in the psychological care and therapeutic education programs of children with cerebral palsy, to help them identify the sensations associated with a specific pain experience.

