The June 15 issue of Spine reports on a study that was undertaken to compare perceptions of emotional stress of female patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) related to their spinal deformity and the need to wear corrective bracing with their parents’ perception. The study concludes that parents’ perceptions of their child’s stress due to body deformity was higher than their child’s own assessment. However, parents and children with AIS do not differ in regard to stress related to brace treatment. Further, the data did not find any association between the duration the brace was worn and the perception of stress levels.
The study coauthors suggest that to maximize the effective of AIS brace treatment, to reduce emotional distress of the patient and prevent dropout from the therapy, parents and patients should be provided with sufficient information about the brace treatment, and it is important to quickly detect emotional distress in patients.
Editor’s note: This story has been adapted from materials provided by Spine.
