Symposium VI
Religion and Spirituality in Chronic Disease
Saturday, May 14, 2016, 10:30 - 12:00
Chair: Piotr Krakowiak
1. The Role of Spirituality in the Lives of COPD Patients and their Caregivers
Anna Janowicz, I. Damps-Konstanska, Dr. hab. P. Krakowiak, K. Swietnicka, P. Janowiak, E. Jassem
Spirituality is an integral part of the well-being. It might be particularly important in advanced COPD negatively influencing – if not addressed - their quality of life. However there is no reliable tool to assess spiritual needs of COPD patients during medical evaluation. Recently, FICA questionnaire enabling to qualify the spirituality in chronically ill patients has been developed. The disease, especially incurable and chronic, has also an impact on family members. As caregivers they are partners for doctors, nurses and physiotherapists in the provision of home care. Therefore, their needs should be assessed and fulfilled, including those spiritual.
The aim of the study is to assess the role of spirituality in the lives of advanced and COPD patients and their caregivers using FICA questionnaire.
The study is conducted in 7 patients with advanced COPD and their caregivers with use of Polish adaptation of FICA questionnaire. The research tool of faith index has been developed by C. Puchalski with a group of primary care physicians, to help physicians and other healthcare professionals address spiritual issues in patients and their care providers. The acronym FICA stands for: F (faith), I (importance), C (community), A (address in care), four parts assessing separate domains of the spirituality, which may be important in the everyday medical practice.
Results: are still to be completed.
The addressing spiritual assessment in advanced COPD patients should be an integrated part of health care. The FICA questionnaire is useful tool of evaluation in patients with advanced COPD and their caregivers.
PowerPoint slides of the presentation (PDF)
2. The Spiritual Needs of Patients with Dementia and their Careers. A Systematic Review
Piotr Krakowiak, Karolina Kramkowska
Global data shows an increasing number of people affected by dementia. Patients affected by dementia and their family careers, have specific needs caused by the disease burden. Those needs include spiritual domain which is often overlooked in the management of dementia and in needs of informal careers.
The objective of this study is to assess the current status of research on the spiritual needs of people with dementia and their family careers in the international and Polish literature.
This lecture is based on a systematic review of the MedLine, PubMed, PsycARTITLES and Health Source: Nursing/ Academic Edition, and leading Polish medical bases: Po dyplomie, Termedia, Medycyna Praktyczna, ViaMedica and Pielegniarstwo i Zdrowie Publiczne has been performed. Data have been analyzed in the 10 years period, from January 2005 to January 2016. The search was based on the following key words: spiritual needs, dementia, Alzheimer disease, family careers, both in English and Polish language. Excluded were items not directly related to the issue of spiritual needs in dementia.
A total of 28 studies published from 2005–2015 were identified. Excluded were papers on the needs of medical personnel, papers evaluating religion and health or quality of life in the course of CNS diseases other than dementia. Criteria fulfilled five articles with qualitative (n = 4) and theoretic assessment in (n = 1).
Data synthesis shows that there are only a few analyses on the spiritual needs of people with dementia and their family caregivers. Studies are performed only on the institutional wards and do not apply to family caregivers at home. In two of five researches the spirituality is understood as a religious practice. The subject of spirituality in dementia occurs more frequently in the literature in the context of needs of medical personnel, various diseases of the brain not only dementia influence of religion on health and quality of life. There is no Polish research and publications on these topics.
This systematic review shows the scarcity of findings on the spirituality among of people with dementia and their caregivers. Thus, it confirms the urgent need for further studies on this issue internationally and especially in Poland. Data on spiritual domain would help in more holistic management of dementia helping in care provision, especially for family caregivers of dementia patients.
3. Styles of Religious Coping and Dispositional Optimism Among Chronically Ill Patients
Joanna Zolnierz, Jaroslaw Sak, Jakub Pawlikowski, Andrzej Prystupa
(Presented as a poster)
Contemporary the interest in the subject of the influence of the religiosity on the human health is taken by the representatives of various scientific disciplines. It has been shown relationship between religiosity and the presence of positive mental states. It was also found that more religiousness people care more about health and live longer and religion is a form of prevention of undesirable social behavior. Simultaneously, the health psychology indicates on the special significance of the dispositional optimism for the human health. It appears to be associated with slower chronical diseases progression. In this context, it seems reasonable to undertake studies to clarify the relationship between the style of religious coping and the level of dispositional optimism in the groups of patients and healthy respondents.
Aim and methods: The aim of this study was to analyze appearing relationship between subjective and objective indicators of the health condition, dispositional optimism, style of religious coping and the frequency of appearing of religious crises in the group of chronically ill patients (N=100). The control group was 200 healthy people.
The study was carried out by using questionnaires: Religious Coping Scale - short version (Brief RCOPE), the Scale of Religious Crisis (SKR) of W. Prezyna and Life Orientation Test (LOT-R) of M.F. Scheier, C.S. Carver and M.W. Bridges. LOT-R is the 10-items self-report questionnaire that evaluates generalized expectations of positive and negative life outcomes.
4. Is it Important for a Physician to Adress Patient's Spirituality and How Should it Be Done? A Literature Review and a Concept of Teamwork in Pastoral Care of Brothers Hospitallers of Saint John of God
Maciej W. Klimasinski
In this review I atempt to answer four issues. First, I analyse if patients raport that their need for spiritual care is met or if they claim that something in medical care is missing. Here the difference between religion and spirituality is explained and many ways of understanding the latter are presented. Next, I examine throughly whether spirituality actually benefits health. Correlations with stress, coping, mortality, pain, mental health, quality of life, dental health, hipertention, heart diseases and cancer are discussed. Thirdly, the role of a medical doctor in spiritual care is identified by recalling opinions of patients, phisicians and medical students. Also the use of various spiritual assesment tools, prayer and directing patients to other members of the team are being looked at. Finally, a way of developing spiritual care in Poland is proposed by listing educational programs and professional chaplaincy practices in the world, as well as Polish initiatives, local problems and opportunities for improvement in this field.