Child Psychology and Psychiatry

Short term (up
to 4 months)
Children
:
Degree routines/activities
re-established
Absence from
school
If prolonged —
family/school liaison
Persistent
Ability to use support within
family/from peers
Type of grief symptoms
If signs of trauma Psycho-education —
monitor
Severe/
persisting
Opportunities to express grief
Level of distress/avoidance
If marked
Psycho-education —
monitor
Opportunities to consolidate,
increase understanding
Lack of stability/further losses
Yes
Family/school
liaison — monitor
Family
:
high level of distress/
mental health difficulties
Assess help needed/
wanted
Interfering
with
functioning
Lack of support for adults
Consider ways of
increasing — monitor
(
continued overleaf
)
97

---

Children bereaved by parent or sibling death
Table 16.1
(
continued
)
Time
Context
Post-death
Implications for Management
Monitor
Advise/consult
Consider
with professional
referral if:
Longer term
Children
:
Persistence of marked distress/
emergence of disturbance
Psycho-education/
increase support
Interfering
with
functioning
Trauma symptoms
Yes
Difficulties with peers
School liaison
Persistent
Family
:
Adult mental health difficulties
Assess help needed/
wanted
Persistent
Marked relationship difficulties
Assess help needed/
wanted
Persistent
REFERENCES
[1]
Worden JW. (1996)
Children and Grief: When a
Parent Dies
. New York: Guilford Press.
[2]
Balk DE. (1996) Models for understanding adoles-
cent coping with bereavement.
Death Studies
20
,
367– 87.
[3]
Dowdney L. (2000) Annotation: childhood bereave-
ment following parental death.
Journal of Child
Psychology and Psychiatry
7
, 819– 30.
[4]
Lin KK, Sandler IN, Ayers TS
et al
. (2004)
Resilience in parentally bereaved children and
adolescents seeking preventive services.
Journal
of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology
33
,
673– 83.
[5]
Dowdney L, Wilson R, Maughan B
et al
. (1999)
Bereaved children: psychological disturbance and
service provision.
British Medical Journal
319
,
354– 7.
[6]
Freeman LN, Shaffer D, Smith H. (1996) Neglected
victims of homicide: the needs of young siblings of
murder victims.
American Journal of Orthopsychi-
atry