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Supportive Care in Cancer

, Volume 27, Issue 3, pp 901–909 | Cite as

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

  • Soolmaz Moosavi
  • Camelia RohaniEmail author
  • Fariba Borhani
  • Mohammad Esmaeel Akbari
Original Article
First Online:
  • 184 Downloads

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.

Keywords

Spiritual care Obstacles Facilitators Cancer patient Oncology nurse Spiritual care team 
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Notes

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.

Authors’ contribution

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.

Compliance with ethical standards

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Copyright information

© Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2018

Authors and Affiliations

  • Soolmaz Moosavi
    • 1
  • Camelia Rohani
    • 2
    Email author
  • Fariba Borhani
    • 3
  • Mohammad Esmaeel Akbari
    • 4
  1. 1.School of Nursing & MidwiferyShahid Beheshti University of Medical SciencesTehranIran
  2. 2.Community Health Nursing Department, School of Nursing and MidwiferyShahid Beheshti University of Medical SciencesTehranIran
  3. 3.Medical Surgical Department, School of Nursing and MidwiferyShahid Beheshti University of Medical SciencesTehranIran
  4. 4.Cancer Research CenterShahid Beheshti University of Medical SciencesTehranIran

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