The Relationship between Spiritual Health with Social Adjustment and Quality of Life in Cancer Patients

Background & aim:

Spiritual health can play an important role in lives of cancer patients because of its impact on quality of life and patient’s adjustment to illness. This study has been performed to determine the relationship between spiritual health with social adjustment and quality of life in cancer patients of comprehensive center of cancer in Mazandaran.

This was a descriptive-correlational study. The statistical population of the study consisted of all cancer patients of comprehensive center of cancer in Mazandaran, affiliated to Imam Khomeini Hospital in Sari city in 2018, which among them 360 patients were selected by stratified random sampling. Research tools were included the Spiritual health Scale of Pulootzin and Ellison (1982), Social adjustment of Bell et al, (1961) and quality of life of Weir and Sherborne (1992). Data were analyzed using Pearson correlation coefficient and multiple regression tests in SPSS-21 software.

The results showed that there was no significant relationship between spiritual health and social adjustment (r=0.011, p>0.83), while there was a significant relationship between spiritual health and quality of life (r=0.277, p<0.001). In the predictive model, the components of spiritual health were able to predict 77% of changes in quality of life in cancer patients (R2=0.077).

According to the findings, spiritual health and its components are important variables in quality of life of cancer patients, thus it is recommended to provide the cancer patients with necessary training in spiritual health excellence and attitude and understanding of God as well as moral development.