Table 2.
Sibling Chronic Illness and Somatic Symptoms
| Source | Study Design | Sample Country and N | Age Range/Mean (SD) | Sibling Disease | Somatic Symptom Measurement | Results |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cadman (1988) | Cross-sectional | Canada 3,294 | 12–16 | Blindness, deafness, severe speech problems, severe pain, asthma, heart problems, epilepsy, kidney disease, arthritis, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, spina bifida, diabetes, cancer, cystic fibrosis, physical deformities | Survey Diagnostic Instrument | Children with sibling with chronic health problems only at small risk of somatization (OR = 1.6) |
| Gold (1999) | Cross-sectional | United States 97- siblings 56- ill children | Siblings 11.24 Ill children 10.41 | Sickle cell disease | CBCL | Report less somatization than ill siblings. Do not have clinically significant levels of somatization when compared to sex matched norms for CBCL |
| Hamama (2008) | Cross-sectional | Israeli Jewish 100 | Siblings 8–19 | Cancer | Frequent symptoms scale | Role overload correlated with somatic symptoms in siblings; somatic symptoms negatively correlated with self-control and self-efficacy |
| Lahteenmaki (2004) | Cross-sectional/repeated measures | Finland 33 siblings 357 healthy controls | 3–17 | Cancer | Huttunen’s test | No difference between siblings and controls on somatic symptoms |
| Massie (2012) | Cross-sectional | Canadian 108 | 7–17 | Cancer | CBCL | Siblings reported higher somatic problems than normative population |
| Von Dongen-Melman (1995) | Cross-sectional | Netherlands 60 | 4–16 | Cancer | Amsterdam Biographic Questionnaire for Children (ABV-K); CBCL | On the ABV-K, siblings reported significantly less somatization than controls. No difference found on CBCL somatization subscale. |
| Zeltzer (1996) | Cross-sectional | United States 254 | 5–18 (10.65) | Cancer | National Health Survey Data; CBCL; Youth Self Report | Parent-reported and sibling self-reported higher somatization than non-clinical norms, but lower than clinical normative samples. Adolescent boys had somatization scores as high as clinical normative scores. Higher sibling somatization associated with higher sibling reported interpersonal adjustment difficulties. |