IntroductionThe purpose of this study was to identify the daily problems experienced by school-age children in remission from cancer. It also sought to assess the predictive value of these problems on the mental health of these children 1 year after the first assessment.Patients and methodAgainst this background, 50 children in remission from cancer and in mainstream education, aged 8–12 years, completed two questionnaires: the Quality of Life Systemic Inventory for Children (QLSI-C) (Missotten et al., 2007) and the Child Depression Inventory (CDI). THE QLSI-C consists of 20 life areas: Sleep, Diet, Physical pain, Health, Clothing, Physical appearance, Bedroom, Grandparents, Mother, Father, Siblings, Friends, How my friends talk about me, School, School results, Sport, Non-sporting activities, Autonomy, Obedience to authority, and Tolerance of frustration. Each of these 20 life areas was evaluated by the child by reference on each occasion to an ideal situation, first in relation to their current situation and then in relation to their personal goals, in order to measure the gap between these two evaluations. This difference was then weighted by the importance given to each life area and the dynamic situation of approximation to or distance from the goals. All the children in this study were seen in person for two interviews 1 year apart (T1 and T2).ResultsThe analyses conducted following the PLS-PM approach enabled eight of the 20 life areas evaluated to be identified as difficult to access by the children in this study. These analyses also showed that the difficulties perceived by children in remission from cancer have mainly proximal effects (i.e., short-term) on the discomfort experienced (direct effect of difficulties expressed in T1 on discomfort felt at T1; idem for T2). However, the areas perceived as difficult at T1 did not enable distal effects (i.e., effect over a year) on the discomfort expressed in T2 to be updated. Nonetheless, the conflicts at T1 fed the conflicts at T2 and, as a consequence, indirectly affected the experience of depression at T2.DiscussionThe discussion examines the nature of the daily difficulties perceived by school-age children in remission from cancer and the short-term psychological distress experienced by these children. It concludes that the difficulties encountered by children in remission from cancer are not necessarily cumulative over time and that they do not inevitably result in permanent psychological suffering.