Psychometric qualities of the Pediatric Inventory for Parents, Dutch version

Childhood cancer is a very stressful event in the life of the entire family
involved.
There is a lack of relevant, reliable and valid tools for the assessment of
parental stress and coping (Streisand, 2001). A more illness-specific measure
of parent stress level is needed to assess the impact of a child's illness on
the entire family system.
In order to determine which parents will require most psychological
counselling, and to be able to evaluate the effectiveness of psychological
interventions, the Pediatric Inventory for Parents (PIP) has been developed by
Randi Streisand (Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Sciences, Children's
National Medical Centre in Washington, DC).

The aim of the present study is to develop a Dutch version of the Pediatric
Inventory for Parents and to examine its psychometric properties (test-retest
reliability and content validity) in parents of pediatric cancer patients and
parents of children undergoing a stem cell transplantation.
The PIP will be used in a future study as an evaluation tool to determine the
effectiveness of a psychological intervention, targeted to enhance coping
skills and to reduce parental distress.

Parents will be approached by letter. An informed consent form and information
of the study will be supplied. If parents agree to participate, date and time
are scheduled to meet in the outpatients clinic. Here parents are asked to
complete the questionnaires, separately from each other. If a parent is unable
to come to the clinic, the questionnaires will be mailed and asked to return by
mail.
About half of the participants will be asked to fill in the PIP once more,
about a week later. This is to calculate the reliabilty of the scale.

Completing the questionnaires will take approximately 30-40 minutes. The
parents that are selected to fill in the PIP once more after a week, will need
about 10 more minutes.