The Mutual Effects of Perceived Spiritual Needs on Quality of Life in Patients With Advanced Cancer and Family Caregivers.
Li-Ting Huang, Chun-Yi Tai, Joshua Longcoy and 1 others
PMID 34185726WHAT IT FOUND
Hospice patients with advanced cancer and family caregivers shared spiritual needs, especially being with family and unmet religious services.
Their own needs related to their own quality of life, not the other person's.
Key findings
01Going to religious services and being with friends were the most unmet spiritual needs for patients and family caregivers.
02Patients' outlook needs significantly predicted their own functional and social/spiritual well-being, and caregivers' outlook and community needs significantly predicted their own mental health.
03The partner effects were not statistically significant, so one person's spiritual needs did not significantly predict the other person's quality of life.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The sample was mostly non-Hispanic white, Christian, and married, so the results may not apply to minority groups or different religious traditions. Patients who were confused or actively dying and caregivers receiving cancer treatment were excluded, limiting generalizability to those groups. The analysis did not examine whether effects differed by kinship or gender because the study could not support the required sample size. The patient quality-of-life scale reported Cronbach’s coefficient alpha .53 for the total scale, .60 for psychophysiological well-being, and .59 for functional well-being. The spiritual needs measure reported Cronbach’s coefficient alpha from .67 to .90 across subscales, and the authors note that spirituality and religiousness can overlap, which complicates measurement. The study was cross-sectional and did not test an intervention.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. The article is listed as supported by NIH extramural funding.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the significant actor effects as proof that meeting spiritual needs improves quality of life. The study was cross-sectional and did not test an intervention, so it reports associations at one time point, not cause.