Psychosocial situation of siblings of chronically ill children

Chronic illness of a child has an influence over the whole family system. Despite this fact healthy siblings have been overlooked by the majority of research. Some foreign studies declare that this population is in higher risk of developing psychsocial problems. The purpose of this thesis is to conduct a closer study on psychosocial characteristics of the siblings of children with diabetes mellitus type 1. The main concern of the theoretical part is the review of current literature dealing with the topic of siblings of chronically ill child and their families. The conducted research included quantitative and qualitative methods exploring sibling psychosocial problems and prosocial behaviour, self-esteem, siblings attitude towards illness and family functioning. The results stress out the important relationship between sibling adjustment, self-esteem and individual and family characteristics. The results also present the main themes connected with siblings feeling of fear, sadness and anger, with applied coping strategies and perceived rewards and costs of the illness for family. Keywords: siblings, diabetes mellitus type 1, psychosocial situatio