A group intervention based on acceptance and commitment therapy can help parents of children with comorbid asthma and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) build resilience and self-efficacy—leading to better health outcomes for the children in the long term. These findings were published today in JAMA Pediatrics.
Yuen Yu Chong, Ph.D., of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and colleagues enrolled 118 parents who had a child between ages 3 and 11 with a diagnosis of asthma and ADHD. Half the parents received usual asthma care, which included regular follow-ups, one group educational session on asthma management, and referrals for ADHD services. The other half received usual care along with six weeks of acceptance and commitment therapy for parenting in asthma management (ACT-PAM); this small-group therapy taught parents how to make action plans to manage their child’s asthma and ADHD using principles such as acceptance, mindfulness, and positive parenting.
Twelve months after the intervention ended, the parents who received ACT-PAM—and their children—showed significant improvements in a variety of measures. Children in the ACT-PAM group had about 67% fewer unscheduled health care visits for asthma exacerbations on average compared with the usual care group (0.5 versus 1.3). “While modest, this reduction is clinically meaningful, particularly for children with ADHD, who face exacerbation risk due to attentional and behavioral challenges,” the researchers wrote.
Parents in ACT-PAM also reported greater reductions in their child’s ADHD symptoms than the usual care group, as well as greater reductions in their own psychological inflexibility and greater confidence in managing their child’s asthma.
“Integrating positive parenting with ACT provided a holistic intervention that improved asthma management, behavioral outcomes, and parental resilience, which are often neglected in traditional single-diagnosis asthma care,” Chong and colleagues wrote. Further, “ACT helped parents shift from experiential avoidance to values-based caregiving, indirectly improving child ADHD outcomes.”
For related information, see the American Journal of Psychotherapy article “Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Posttraumatic Psychopathology: A Group-Based Telehealth Intervention.”
(Image: Getty Images/iStock/FatCamera)
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