Research Article A Qualitative Study of Psychosocial Problems among Parents of Children with Cerebral Palsy Attending Two Tertiary Care Hospitals in Western India Somashekhar Nimbalkar, 1,2 Shyamsundar Raithatha, 3 Rutvij Shah, 1 and Dhara Antani Panchal 2 1 Department of Pediatrics, Pramukhswami Medical College, Karamsad, Anand, Gujarat 388325, India 2 Central Research Services, Charutar Arogya Mandal, HM Patel Academic Center, Karamsad, Anand, Gujarat 388325, India 3 Department of Community Medicine, Pramukhswami Medical College, Karamsad, Anand, Gujarat 388325, India Correspondence should be addressed to Shyamsundar Raithatha; sundar.shyamsundar@gmail.com Received 9 December 2013; Accepted 15 January 2014; Published 20 February 2014 Academic Editors: N. Sulaiman and A. Vellinga Copyright © 2014 Somashekhar Nimbalkar et al. his is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Objective. To explore the psychosocial problems faced by the parents of children with cerebral palsy (CP) in rural and urban settings. Design. Qualitative research design using focus group discussions (FGDs) was used for the study. Setting. Two FGDs comprising one at a rural tertiary level care hospital and the other at an urban tertiary level care hospital were conducted. Participants. A total of thirteen parents participated in the two FGDs. Main Outcome Measured. Psychosocial problems experienced by the parents of children sufering from CP were measured. Results. he problems experienced by the mothers were associated with common themes such as disturbed social relationships, health problems, inancial problems, moments of happiness, worries about future of the child, need for more support services, and lack of adequate number of trained physiotherapists. All the parents had children with problems since birth and most had approached various health care providers for a cure for their child. Conclusions. A wide range of psychosocial problems are experienced by the parents of children with CP. Studies like this can provide valuable information for designing a family centered care programme for children with CP. 1. Introduction Cerebral palsy (CP), with a prevalence of 2.83 per 1000 child- ren among the age group of 0 to 19 years, is one of the most common causes of disability in India [1]. A child with CP sufers from several problems such as spastic paraly- sis, cognitive impairment, chronic pain, speech and visual impairment, and gastrointestinal and feeding problems [2]. hey also have several limitations in self-care functions such as feeding, dressing, bathing, and mobility. hese limitations can result in requirements for long-term care that far exceed the usual needs of normal children [3]. he diiculties faced by children with CP result in their parents experiencing a higher level of stress [4] which has an adverse efect on their physical health and social well-being [5, 6]. Changes in healthcare systems and societal attitudes have resulted in most children staying at home in the care of family rather than in an institution. Moreover, in western countries, a greater emphasis is laid on family-centered care, wherein the focus of attention is the entire family, rather than just the child, and this has been found to be highly efective [7– 11]. he family, together with service providers, is able to make informed decisions about the services and supports the child and family shall receive. In order to develop a family-centered care practice, it is imperative to understand and address the psychosocial problems experienced by the caregivers of the afected children. Several studies of this kind have been undertaken in western countries [5, 12, 13] but very few are reported in India. In a country like India there are signiicant diferences between the environments of urban and rural areas. Our study seeks to explore the psychosocial problems experienced by the parents of children with CP. Hindawi Publishing Corporation ISRN Family Medicine Volume 2014, Article ID 769619, 6 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/769619