title: Are children as relatives our responsibility? - How nurses perceive their role in caring for children as relatives of seriously ill patients.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The purpose of this study was to elucidate how nurses perceive their role in caring for children as relatives to a parent with a serious physical illness.
  
  
  METHODS
  A qualitative explorative design with focus group interviews was used. In total, 22 nurses working at one neurological, one haematological and two oncological wards were interviewed. The transcripts from the interviews were analysed in steps in accordance with inductive qualitative content analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  This study revealed six variations in how nurses perceived their role in the encounter with child relatives, ranging from being convinced that it is not their responsibility to being aware of the children's situation and working systematically to support them.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Nurses should consider whether their patients have children who might be affected by their parent's illness. The nurses' self-confidence when meeting these children must be increased by education in order to strengthen their professional role. Furthermore, guidelines on how to encounter child relatives are required.
authors.affiliation: CHILD-Research Group, Department of Nursing Science, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, S-551 11, Jönköping, Sweden; Futurum Academy for Health and Care Region Jönköping County, S-551 85, Jönköping, Sweden. Electronic address: marie.golsater@ju.se.
authors.forename: Marie
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Golsäter
authors.affiliation: ADULT-research Group, Department of Nursing Science, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, S-551 11, Jönköping, Sweden.
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Henricson
authors.affiliation: CHILD-Research Group, Department of Nursing Science, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, S-551 11, Jönköping, Sweden.
authors.forename: Karin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Enskär
authors.affiliation: CHILD-Research Group, Department of Nursing Science, School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, S-551 11, Jönköping, Sweden.
authors.forename: Susanne
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Knutsson
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005190:Family / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D024802:Nurse's Role; D009732:Nursing Care / Q000523:psychology*; D036301:Qualitative Research; D013548:Sweden
keywords: Children as relatives; Nursing; Parents; Qualitative research; Support