Assessment of Spiritual Care Practices Among Nurses Caring for Cancer Patients in a Tertiary Hospital in Nigeria

Abstract

Introduction: The importance of spirituality in health and wellness has been documented in the literature. While the developed countries have reported robust evidence of spirituality in nursing practices, there is scant evidence in low- and middle-income countries like Nigeria.

Objectives: This study assessed the spiritual care practices of the nurses attending to cancer patients in a tertiary health institution in Ilorin. It further determined factors associated with spiritual caring practices among nurses.

Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted between November 2021 and December 2021 to assess spiritual care practices among nurses caring for cancer patients. During the study period, 66 nurses were recruited randomly from the hospital's medical and surgical clinics, palliative care department, and Obstetrics and Gynecology department. Twelve items validated Nurses' spiritual care practices questionnaire was adapted for this study. Data were analyzed using IBM SPSS version 23.

Results: The mean age of the respondents was 36.5 years ( + 10.1) while female respondents made up 83.3%. About 48% of the nurses had good spiritual caring practices while 52% had poor spiritual caring practices. Nurses with training in oncology (96%) with p = .001 and those with spirituality training (86.2%) with p = .017 showed significant association with spiritual care practices. This study concluded that spiritual care practices among nurses are sub-optimal with training as a significantly associated factor with spiritual care practices.

Conclusion: It is, therefore, suggested that spiritual care practices should be incorporated into all nursing training and curriculum. This will allow them to better support the spiritual needs of the patients, especially those with chronic diseases like cancer.

Keywords: cancer patients; caring practices; nurses; spirituality.