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Charlotte Angelhoff

I am a specialist nurse in paediatrics for children and adolescents. I am also a doctoral student. My research area is the quality of sleep, stress and mood of parents when their children need medical care.

The quality of sleep, stress and mood of parents when their children need medical care

Sound sleep is important for health and wellbeing. Stress and anxiety make it harder to sleep properly which in turn causes more stress and anxiety. This can easily turn into a negative spiral that is difficult to break. 

 In the long term, sleep problems and stress can lead to cardiovascular diseases, exhaustion syndrome, diabetes and other stress-related illnesses. Parents with chronic stress not only risk their own health deteriorating; the stress can also have a negative effect on the health of their children. Sleep affects mood and cognitive functions such as memory and learning ability. These functions are of particular importance for parents who have to take crucial medical decisions and be involved in the care of their sick child.

The overall objective of my thesis is to increase knowledge more about the quality of sleep, stress, stress management ability and mood of parents when their child needs medical care. The thesis is comprised of both qualitative and quantitative studies.

Results from studies

The results from Study 1 show that parents with a prematurely born child are affected negatively by a lack of sleep and by being in a stressful environment. Being able to be together, sleeping in the same room, physical closeness and sitting skin-to-skin with their small child had a positive effect on sleep quality. This has resulted in the planning of Study 5 where we will investigate what effect continuous skin-to-skin care has on quality of sleep and mood.

In Study 2, parents with a child undergoing hospital-linked care in the home were interviewed. The parents described how disturbed sleep led to poorer memory, tiredness, less patience with the family and partner, lack of energy and depression. Changing one’s own routines to fit in with the needs of the child, support from other people, security, physical activity and time alone were important factors for good quality sleep.

In Studies 3 and 4, we study the sleep, mood, stress (cortisol) and stress management of parents who sleep over at the children and adolescents’ ward together with their child, 0-18 years, and then make a comparison in the home four weeks later.
My ambition is that my research will lead to increased understanding of parents’ needs for sleep when they are caring for their sick children and identify care measures that will facilitate sleep for parents of sick children and adolescents. Stress and lack of sleep do not only affect parents’ health and wellbeing; their ability to take care of their sick child is also affected.

Publications

2023

Siri Jakobsson Store, Maria Tillfors, Charlotte Angelhoff, Annika Norell-Clarke (2023) A robot intervention for adults with ADHD and insomnia-A mixed-method proof-of-concept study PLOS ONE, Vol. 18, Article e0290984 Continue to DOI
Siri Jakobsson Støre, Maria Tillfors, Erik Wästlund, Charlotte Angelhoff, Gerhard Andersson, Annika Norell (2023) Mind, Body and Machine: Preliminary Study to Explore Predictors of Treatment Response After a Sleep Robot Intervention for Adults with Insomnia. Nature and Science of Sleep, Vol. 15, p. 567-577 Continue to DOI
Charlotte Angelhoff, Tomas Faresjö, Anna Lena Sundell (2023) Measuring hair cortisol concentration, insomnia symptoms and quality of life in preschool children with severe early childhood caries - a case-control pilot study Acta Odontologica Scandinavica, Vol. 81, p. 508-516 Continue to DOI

Collaboration with researchers at Linköping University

External partner

Shefaly Shorey

Reader

  • Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine National University of Singapore

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