Parents of children with chronic disorders are at increased risk of mental health difficulties. We investigated how coronavirus anxiety and pandemic restrictions affected parental mental health during the COVID 19-pandemic. Parents of children with chronic disorders (N=43) in Norway were followed prospectively for 12 months. Each month, parents completed the Hopkins Symptoms Checklist (SCL-5) as a measure of mental health and the Coronavirus Anxiety Scale (CAS). The stringency index from the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker was used as a measure of pandemic restrictions. The results showed no change in mental health difficulties or coronavirus anxiety at the group level over the 12 months. At the between-person level, parents with higher level of coronavirus anxiety reported more mental health difficulties ( b = .96, p < .001) and an increase in mental health difficulties over the 12 months ( b = .05, p = .025). At the within-person level, an increase in coronavirus anxiety from one time to another was associated with an increase in mental health difficulties over that same time ( b = .84, p < .001). There was no significant effect of pandemic restrictions in the final model ( b = .02, p = .066). We conclude that coronavirus anxiety, but not pandemic restrictions, affected the mental health trajectory of parents of children with chronic disorders during the COVID-19 pandemic. The main implication is that during ongoing or future crises, targeting crisis event-specific anxiety may prevent worsening mental health difficulties among parents of children with chronic disorders.
Fjermestad et al. (Wed,) studied this question.