"You're listening but you're not hearing": qualitative exploration of parents' lived experience of paediatric sepsis.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Sepsis is a life-threatening condition of significant mortality and morbidity burden in children. There is limited evidence exploring the lived experiences of parents whose children have survived or died from sepsis, nor their support needs, despite growing awareness of poor sepsis outcomes.

Objective

This study aims to understand the lived experiences of parents of children affected by sepsis, both surviving and bereaved, and identify gaps in support services to inform future interventions.

Methods

A phenomenological-hermeneutic design was used, with data collected through a focus group and individual interviews with 11 parents of children treated for paediatric sepsis in Queensland, Australia. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to analyse the data.

R

SUBMITTER: O'Keefe M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12478235 | biostudies-literature | 2025

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature