Spiritual issues and needs: Perspectives from patients with advanced cancer and nonmalignant disease. A qualitative study

Abstract

Enabling patients to deal with their spiritual needs through affirmative relationships with health professionals may improve quality of life and reduce use of health resources. Further research to explore the relationship between spiritual distress and health service utilization is indicated.

Spirituality and/or religious faith: A means for coping with the effects of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis/motor neuron disease?

“…Societal attitudes frequently deny mortality hindering the expression of existential questions about life and death (Grant et al, 2004); personal illness narratives provide the vehicle for sharing deep thoughts, some of which may be of a spiritual or religious nature. The availability of such illness narratives provides access to pertinent stories from an infinitely more diverse sample than could be obtained using more conventional techniques and avoids intrusions into people's lives as they cope with illness; as such this approach can be regarded as distinctly non-intrusive.…”

“…Management focuses on relieving distressing symptoms, but clear limitations exist as psychosocial effects frequently compound physical symptoms. When faced with a terminal illness, like ALS/MND, there is an inclination to question the meaning of life and death (Young & McNicoll, 1998;Oliver 2002;Grant et al, 2004); thoughts turn towards spirituality and faith for comfort and consolation (Oliver 2002); the importance of religion and spirituality in improving quality of life and decision making as death approaches is acknowledged (Delgado-Guay 2014).Spirituality is a domain of supportive and palliative care in national policies such as the UK End-of-Life Care Programme (DH 2008), quality-of-life (QOL) measures (WHO 1998), and ALS/MND-specific care recommendations (Mitsumoto et al, 2005). As a concept, spirituality does raise some issues for researchers and commentators.…”

The Evidence Base for Oxygen for Chronic Refractory Breathlessness: Issues, Gaps, and a Future Work Plan

“…Firstly, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) research has increasingly focussed on symptoms and symptom improvement, largely because treatments that lead to improvement in survival are few. Secondly, there has been inequitable access to palliative care services for people with non-malignant disease as highlighted by powerful patient voices describing their experience and the impact of the symptom on the realities of daily living (2)(3)(4)(5), as well as comparable symptom burden(6-11). Thirdly, breathlessness has been described as, "the pain of non-malignant disease;" the conceptual similarities between pain and breathlessness, the "total" experience affecting all domains of life, and the pathophysiology of the symptoms and their response to treatment are remarkably similar, with observations supported by neuroimaging and clinical studies (12;13).…”

Efficacy of different instruments for the identification of the nursing diagnosis spiritual distress

“…It is important that the nurse be alert to signs of Spiritual distress, as well as aspects related to its manifestation, since the presence of this diagnosis may worsen the physical and emotional symptoms and decrease the ability to face the disease (2) .…”