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Factors affecting spiritual care practices of oncology nurses: a qualitative study

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Abstract

Purpose

Spiritual care is a component of the holistic nursing approach. But in practice, nurses face many challenges during the implementation of spirituality care. Thus, the aim of this study was to explore the barriers and facilitators affecting spiritual care practices by oncology nurses.

Methods

This qualitative study was conducted using a conventional content analysis based on semi-structured interviews with 25 participants, including cancer patients and their family members, oncology nurses, physicians, psychologist, and spiritual researcher-therapists.

Results

The results showed that the two main themes of the study, “spiritual competency” and “spiritual inefficiency” in healthcare organization, were two major factors in implementing spiritual care practices for cancer patients by oncology nurses.

Conclusions

The findings of this study emphasize the necessity of developing coherent spiritual care programs in hospitals and removing administrative barriers. Teaching spiritual care in nursing courses at schools and continuing education programs for training of healthcare team members are necessary. Likewise, forming a spiritual care team with oncology nurses at the center and defining their members’ roles and responsibilities are essential. Hospital managers can also make fruitful steps by establishing a monitoring system and identifying the needs and barriers for spiritual care in oncology settings.

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Acknowledgments

The present study is a part of the findings of the doctoral Thesis. Authors thank and appreciate all cancer patients, their family members, and healthcare team members as well as spiritual researcher-therapists participating in this study.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Nursing & Midwifery, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Soolmaz Moosavi

  2. Community Health Nursing Department, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Hashemi Rafsanjani Hwy, Valiasr Street, Tehran, Iran

    Camelia Rohani

  3. Medical Surgical Department, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Fariba Borhani

  4. Cancer Research Center, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Mohammad Esmaeel Akbari

Authors
  1. Soolmaz Moosavi
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  2. Camelia Rohani
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  4. Mohammad Esmaeel Akbari
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Contributions

SM and CR did the planning and design of the study. This study was supervised by CR. SM was the leading author for drafting of the article and responsible for identifying relevant references. FB and MEA contributed significant text. All authors, SM, CR, FB, and MEA, were in close collaboration and responsible for critical revisions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Camelia Rohani.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Moosavi, S., Rohani, C., Borhani, F. et al. Factors affecting spiritual care practices of oncology nurses: a qualitative study. Support Care Cancer 27, 901–909 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-018-4378-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-018-4378-8

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