Breaking Bad News: Communication Around Parental Multiple Sclerosis With Children ELENA PALIOKOSTA, MD, PHD STAVROULA DIAREME,PHD GERASIMOS KOLAITIS, MD, PHD EMMANUEL TSALAMANIOS, MD SPYROS FERENTINOS,PHD SOFIA ANASONTZI, MA EIRINI LYMPINAKI, MSC ALKIS TSIANTIS, MD JOHN TSIANTIS, MD, DPM, FRC, PSYCHD CLEMENTINE KARAGEORGIOU, MD, PHD GEORGE ROMER,DR, MED This study investigates the relation of communication around parental multiple sclerosis (MS) to family dysfunction and mental health problems of the children in Greek families. Fifty-six families with a parent with MS were studied regarding emotional well-being of children, parental depression, family functioning, and ill- ness’ related impairment, correlated to the amount of information about parental illness provided to children. Significant differences were found in three dimen- sions of child psychopathology on mater- nal scores of Child Behavior Checklist, between children who had partial infor- mation about parental illness and the other two groups of children who had ex- plicit or no information at all. Differences were also observed in children’s scores on (Youth Self Report) social problems be- tween the same groups. The finding that children who had only partial informa- tion about their parents’ illness presented more problems, illustrates the importance of “how, what, and how much” of informa- tion is communicated to children. Clinical implications are discussed in terms of the families’ difficulties with communicating parental illness with their children and possible need for profesional support. Keywords: children of parents with multi- ple sclerosis, family communication around illness, children’s mental health problems Elena Paliokosta, Stavroula Diareme, Gerasimos Kolaitis, Emmanuel Tsalamanios, Spyros Ferentinos, Sofia Anasontzi, Eirini Lympinaki, Alkis Tsiantis, and John Tsiantis, Department of Child and Adoles- cent Psychiatry, Athens University Medical School, “Agia Sophia” Children’s Hospital, Athens, Greece; Clementine Karageorgiou, Neurology Department Athens General Hospital, Athens, Greece; and George Romer, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Hamburg- Eppendorf, Germany. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Elena Paliokosta, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park SE5 8AF, London, UK. E-mail: Eleni.Paliokosta@iop.kcl.ac.uk Families, Systems, & Health © 2009 American Psychological Association 2009, Vol. 27, No. 1, 64 –76 1091-7527/09/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0015226 64 This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.