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The effect of applying Spiritual Care Model on well-being and quality of care in cancer patients

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Abstract

Purpose

The study was an attempt to explore the effect of applying spiritual model of nursing care on spiritual well-being and quality of spiritual care in cancer patients.

Method

A quasi-experimental study, the present inquiry was carried out with control and intervention groups with participation of 72 patients and 63 nurses in an advanced center in Iran. The Spiritual Care Model (SCM) was designed by the researchers in this study and was performed on the intervention group by nurses after they received proper training. The data were collected using Demographic Information Questionnaire, Spiritual Well-Being Scale (SWBS), and Spiritual Care Delivery Rating Scale (SCDRS) in pre-intervention and post-intervention stages and were analyzed with SPSS v.16.

Results

Before the intervention, the means for spiritual well-being and the quality of spiritual care were not significantly different for the intervention and control groups (p < 0.05). After the intervention, i.e., upon discharge from the hospital, the mean of spiritual well-being in the intervention group was significantly higher than that of the control group (p < 0.001). Based on the opinions of both nurses and patients, the mean of the spiritual care quality was significantly higher in the intervention group in comparison to that in the control group once the intervention was over (p < 0.001).

Conclusion

Given the positive effect of the SCM on enhancing the spiritual care quality and improving the patients’ spiritual well-being, it is recommended that the SCM be used as a proper guideline and as a model for boosting nurses’ professional performance in spiritual care.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the support of the Faculty of Medical Sciences of Tarbiat Modares University and the Vice-Chancellor for Research and Technology of Tarbiat Modares University for providing financial support for this project. Also, we thank the patients, managers and nurses of Khansari Hospital of Arak University of Medical Sciences for their cooperation.

Funding

This article is a part of a Ph.D. dissertation in nursing. The financial supports for this study were provided by the Tarbiat Modares University.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Nursing, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

    Mojtaba Ghorbani & Eesa Mohammadi

  2. Khansari Hospital and Department of Internal Medicine, School of Medicine, Arak University of Medical Sciences, Arak, Iran

    Reza Aghabozorgi

  3. Nursing and Midwifery Care Research Center, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran

    Monir Ramezani

Authors
  1. Mojtaba Ghorbani
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  2. Eesa Mohammadi
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  3. Reza Aghabozorgi
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  4. Monir Ramezani
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Contributions

MG, EM, RA, and MR: study design

MG: data collection

MG, EM, RA, and MR: data analysis and interpretation

MG, EM, RA, and MR: manuscript writing

EM, RA, and MR study supervision

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Eesa Mohammadi.

Ethics declarations

Ethical approval

The study was approved by the Medical Ethics Committee of Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran (IR.TMU.REC.1396.598). Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Appendices

Appendix 1. Spiritual screening

A few simple questions incorporated into initial screening, such as,

“How important is religion and spirituality in your coping?”

If a patient responds that they are important, then a follow-up question could be,

“How well are those resources working for you at this time?”

If the patient describes difficulty with coping and/or that spiritual or religious resources are not working well for him or her,

A more thorough assessment was carried out.

Appendix 2. Spiritual care chart

figure a

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Ghorbani, M., Mohammadi, E., Aghabozorgi, R. et al. The effect of applying Spiritual Care Model on well-being and quality of care in cancer patients. Support Care Cancer 29, 2749–2760 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-020-05781-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-020-05781-7

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