Sickness absence in Swedish parents of children with Down's syndrome: relation to self-perceived health, stress and sense of coherence.
Down's syndrome fathers take triple the child-care sick leave of other parents, so flag high-absence risk early and offer flexible support.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team looked at sick-day records for Swedish parents of children with Down's syndrome. They compared these records to parents of kids without disabilities. The study used registry data, so no one had to fill out surveys.
Parents were tracked for one full year. The researchers counted both personal sick days and days taken off to care for a sick child.
What they found
Most Down's syndrome parents had the same absence rate as other parents. But a small group, six parents, missed more than one hundred days in a year.
Fathers of kids with Down's syndrome stood out. They took triple the child-care sick leave taken by control mothers.
How this fits with other research
Higgins et al. (2021) extends this picture. They asked Down's syndrome caregivers what support they actually want. Top answers were online peer groups, cash help, and easy-to-find local services. Those needs could explain the sky-high leave seen in Eberhart et al. (2006).
Hsieh et al. (2014) also focused on Swedish fathers. Their interviews show dads move from shock to active coping over five years. The huge leave numbers in Eberhart et al. (2006) likely come from dads still in the early steep part of that curve.
Ku et al. (2022) looked at parents in two countries. Culture shaped how much parents support physical activity for their kids. The Swedish registry data in Eberhart et al. (2006) remind us that policy matters too: generous paid leave lets fathers actually take the time.
Why it matters
You now know that a handful of Down's syndrome parents, especially fathers, carry most of the work-loss burden. Screen families early for job strain and offer flexible parent training times. A quick check-in with dads about leave plans can keep therapy on track and protect their paychecks.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: The aims of present study were to study sickness absence among Swedish parents of children with Down's syndrome (DS) and to compare their rates of absence with those of control parents. Sickness absence data for 165 DS parents were compared with those for 174 control parents; all data were for the period 1997-2000. Sickness absence rates were also related to parental self-perceived health, stress and sense of coherence. METHODS: The self-administrated measures of parental self-perceived health, stress and sense of coherence were compared with the number of days of sickness absence. RESULTS: In about two-thirds of the parents in both the study and the control group, no days of sickness absence were registered. Six of the DS parents had remarkably large numbers of days of sickness absence (more than 100 per year). None of the control parents had such high sickness absence rates. It is speculated that there is a small group (less than 5%) of parents who are more vulnerable to the birth of a child with DS. Apart from these six DS parents, sickness absence was not more frequent among the DS parents than among the control parents. DS parents stayed at home to care for their sick DS child three times more often than control parents did for their non-disabled child. DS fathers took greater responsibility in the care of their temporarily sick child and stayed at home to care for the child even more often than control mothers did. DS parents with sickness periods experienced small deterioration in self-perceived health, significantly higher stress and decreased sense of coherence in comparison with parents without sickness periods. CONCLUSIONS: There was a great similarity in sick leave rates due to one's own sickness between DS and control parents, but a small group of DS parents (<5%) may be more vulnerable. DS fathers stayed at home to care for their sick DS child remarkably often.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2006 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.2006.00810.x