Quality of life of children and adolescents siblings of individuals with chronic neurological, neurodevelopmental and mental health disorders: a scoping review
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Abstract
Objective: To carry out a scoping review on the quality of life of chil dren and adolescents siblings of individuals with chronic neurologi cal, neurodevelopmental and mental health disorders. Data sources: The search was performed in PubMed, Medline SciELO and Google Scholar databases. Data synthesis: Overall, 1,664 articles were found in the initial search process. Of these, 1,061 duplicates were removed. Then, 590 were excluded due to lack of appropriateness after reading the titles and abstracts and/or the full text, thus yielding a total of 13 included studies. Of the 13 articles, five (38.6%) were published in the last five years and 100% in the last 15 years, evaluating children and adolescents aged 3 to 18 years, totaling 1,741 samples. As a who le, in eight studies (61.6%) the participants had poorer quality of life than the respective controls. Conclusions: The results suggest that siblings of individuals with chronic neurological, neurodevelopmen tal and mental health disorders tend to have a lower quality of life, and that the balance between risk and protective factors determines the outcome. The results point to the need for further research to in vestigate the quality of life, life satisfaction and well-being of these children and adolescents. From a practical point of view, this scoping review warns that for these siblings it is essential that pediatricians, developmental pediatricians, neuropediatricians and child psychia trists perceive the presence of risk factors, provide surveillance, as sessment and early intervention and maintain focus and investment in the protective factors.
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