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Abstract SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 115 summary and Conclusion It is hypothesized that mentally retarded child ·has a psychological reflection on the parents. The aim of this work was to find out the impact of mentally retarded child on their parents. Regarding subjects and methods, parents of mentally retarded child were contacted through specialized schools of mentally retarded children. Control groups included parents of physically disabled child and parents of normal child. Parents were divided into high and low social standard and were subjected to a semistructured interview to gather demographic criteria, Parenting stress index, Symptom check list 90 and Attitudes toward handicapped questionnaire. Thorough psychiatric and physical examination were also done. All children in this study were subjected to Wechsler I.Q. testing, gathering of demographic data through semistructured interview and thorough physical examination. The main results revealed the following :- Regarding demographic criteria: _ Significant prevalence of positive consanguinity among parents of mentally retarded child and parents of normal child. _ Fathers significantly presented more common with physically disabled child than fathers of mentally retarded child during the interview. _ Perinatal causes of mental retardation constituted 36.6% of cases of mental retardation. Down syndrome constituted 19.5% of cases. Infections constituted 12.2% of cases of mental retardation and SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 116 31.7% were of miscellaneous causes. As regards Parenting stress index : _ Parents of mentally retarded child experience high levels of stress. _ Stress was equally experienced among high and low social standard mothers of mentally retarded child. _ Stress was more experienced with mothers of female mentally retarded child. _Total stress score increased as levels of I.Q. decreased. Symptom check list 90 questionnaire showed that parents of mentally retarded child had high depression, anxiety and psychoticism scores and low hostility score. Clinical psychiatric examination revealed that :- _ Parents of mentally retarded child are more prone to psychiatric disorders. _ Parents of mentally retarded child suffer from Mixed anxiety and depressive disorder and Panic disorder. _ Mothers of mentally retarded female experience more psychiatric disorders than mothers of mentally retarded male. Clinical physical examination showed that:- _ Parents of mentally retarded child suffer from physical disorders that affect more than one system and this is probably due to exposure to high level of stress. Attitudes toward handicapped questionnaire clarified that : _ Parents of mentally retarded child had positive attitudes toward handicapped. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 117 _ High social standard mothers of mentally retarded child had more positive attitude than low social standard mothers toward handicapped. _ With positive consanguinity there was more negative attitudes toward handicapped. Parents of mentally retarded child expressed many concerns and elevated levels of stress during certain events as, initial diagnosis, death fears, fear from next pregnancy, impact on siblings, onset of puberty and associated medical conditions. Availability of community services decreased levels of stress. |