Contributos para o estudo da satisfação com o suporte social dos pais das crianças com doença crónica

Introduction: The social support undestood by the family plays a very important role in their cognitive and emotional processes related to well-being and quality of live in chronic disease situations. Objectives: To analyze the psychometric properties of the Satisfaction Scale of Social Support (ESSS) and their adaptation to parents of children with cancer. Materials and Methods: This is a quantitative, exploratory and descriptive study. We used a questionnaire for the sociodemographic characteristics of the sample and the ESSS. Results: The convenience sample consists of 112 parents of children with cancer. They present a low education, is composed on average for household of 4 elements and belong mostly to the sub-region’s health Porto. ESSS showed good fidelity in all domains, and the Cronbach’s alpha of 0.85 overall. But is the satisfaction subscale with friends/friendship that best explains the satisfaction of social support with a variance of 0.85. The scale also showed that families with higher Apgar (highly functional families) are those with greater satisfaction with social support, as well as a socio -economic. Conclusions: We then consider that the scale is a valid, reliable and adapted to study with parents of children with cancer.