Psychological assessment instruments for family members of critically ill children: a scoping review

Family members of critically ill children may experience a range of psychological difficulties during and after a child’s admission to pediatric intensive care unit (PICU), including anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress symptoms, distress, stress, grief, and challenges in psychological adjustment. A variety of psychological assessment instruments have been used in this population; however, it remains unclear which instruments have been used, what psychological constructs they assess, when they are administered, and whether their measurement properties have been reported. This scoping review aims to identify and describe psychological assessment instruments used for family members of critically ill children. The review will map the psychological constructs assessed, instrument characteristics, target respondents, timing of assessment, scoring methods, cut-off values, and reported measurement properties. Reported measurement properties will be categorized descriptively according to the COSMIN taxonomy. This review will not conduct a full COSMIN systematic review or provide formal recommendations regarding the best instrument. The findings will provide an overview of current instrument use, identify gaps in measurement practice and validation evidence, and inform future research on instrument selection, adaptation, and validation for family members of critically ill children.