Spirituality among family caregivers of cancer patients: The Spiritual Perspective Scale.

Only 124 caregivers were analysed, and the sample was too small for the most detailed bias checks, which usually need at least 200. Caregivers were mostly non-Hispanic white, highly educated, and affluent, and were recruited from one NIH research hospital, so results may not apply to more diverse or community-based caregivers. Only English or Spanish speakers were included. The spirituality measure was analysed cross-sectionally for group differences, so it cannot show that age, gender, education, race/ethnicity, religious affiliation, or caregiving roles cause higher or lower spirituality. The original study was not designed to test the scale's psychometric properties, and other validity checks are still needed. There are no cutoff scores to guide clinical screening with the scale. More than one caregiver per patient was allowed, but the analysis did not use multilevel models because there were too few caregivers per patient cluster.

The authors declared no conflict of interest. The work is listed as NIH intramural research support, and the data came from an NIH caregiver study.

Do not read this as evidence that spiritual care improves caregiver outcomes or that the Spiritual Perspective Scale can be used as a clinical screening tool. It tested measurement properties in 124 mostly non-Hispanic white, highly educated caregivers, and the correlations with meaning and depression were weak to moderate.