An Internet discussion board for parents of mentally ill young children.

PURPOSE

This paper reports parents' use of electronic bulletin board for social support during a pilot study of an Internet intervention.

METHODS

Parents participated for a mean of 13.83 weeks. The convenience sample consisted of six parents. Data were from site access information and parents' postings.

FINDINGS

Excluding one mother who checked frequently for messages, mothers have an average of 5.2 postings. Excluding this one mother, the postings/ accesses ratio was greater than 60%. Parents made postings in four categories of "child's illness" having 37 comments and 36 comments for "group maintenance".

CONCLUSIONS

While the study findings cannot be generalized, these results suggest that parents will use electronic discussion boards.