Sermsri Santati. Asthma management abilities causal model : an empirical test among parent caregivers of the pre-school asthmatic children . Doctoral Degree(Nursing). Mahidol University. : Mahidol University, 2005.
Asthma management abilities causal model : an empirical test among parent caregivers of the pre-school asthmatic children
Abstract:
In asthma care for infants and young children, the increase of parent caregivers’
abilities to manage asthma care has been documented as the major goal for successful
asthma management. By using Orem’s theory of dependent-care as the conceptual
framework, the purposes of this study were to examine the causal relationship among
perceived social support, family hardiness, quality of professional care, and caregiver
burden as they related to asthma management abilities of parent caregivers of the preschool
asthmatic children.
A sample of 253 parent caregivers of pre-school asthmatic children who came to
visit Chest and Allergy Clinics at three hospitals within the Bangkok metropolitan area
was recruited. Parent caregivers were asked to complete 5 questionnaires, which were:
Social Support Questionnaire (SSQ); Family Hardiness Index (FHI); The Care of My
Child with Asthma Scale; Caregivers’ Perceptions of the Quality of Professional Care
Scale (CPQPCS); and Asthma Management Abilities Scale.
By using the LISREL 8.52 program, the causal relationships among five major
variables were tested. The results revealed that the final model was proved to have a
good fit with the data (χ2= 29.02, df = 43, p-value = 0.9491, GFI = 0.98, AGFI = 0.96,
and RMSEA = 0.000) and could explain 2% of the variance in caregiver burden, and
55% of the variance in asthma management abilities of parent caregivers. As expected
by the model, there was a significant medium negative direct effect of caregiver burden
on asthma management abilities (γ = -0.39, p < .001). Quality of professional care and
family hardiness were found to have medium direct significant positive effects (γ =
0.36, p < .001; γ = 0.37, p < .001) on asthma management abilities. Perceived social
support had a small but significant direct negative effect (γ = -0.16, p < .05) on
caregiver burden as well as an indirect influence on asthma management abilities
through caregiver burden (γ = 0.06, p < .05).
Results indicated that even though the factor of burden still had some influence
on management abilities of parent caregivers, the quality of professional care as well as
family hardiness were two other good predictors and worked directly to influence
asthma management abilities in this study. These findings support the role of health care
professionals and hardiness among family members in increasing the dependent-care
agency of parent caregivers to take good care of pre-school asthmatic children.