The Role of Religious Coping, Spiritual Intelligence, and Spiritual Well-being in Predicting the Perceived Stress of Patients with Cancer

One of the main issues facing the patients with cancer is stress and anxiety. On the other hand, religion and spiritual resources are very effective factors in mental health. The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of religious coping, spiritual intelligence, and spiritual well-being in predicting perceived stress in patients with cancer.

In this descriptive cross-sectional study, 120 patients, with cancer who were admitted and treated in blood and oncology department of Imam Khomeini hospital of Ardabil in 2019, were selected as target sample. Data collection tools consisted of perceived stress scale, religious coping scale, spiritual intelligence scale, and spiritual well-being questionnaire.

There was a negative and significant relationship between the perceived stress with the spiritual well-being (β=-0/359: p<0/001), spiritual intelligence (β=-0/170: p<0/007), positive religious coping (β=-0/172: p<0/011) and positive and significant relationship with negative religious coping (β=0/328: p<0/001) in subjects with cancer. The spiritual well-being, religious coping and spiritual intelligence predicted 70% of variance of perceived stress scores of patients with cancer (p<0/01).

Our findings indicate that positive and negative religious coping, spiritual intelligence, and spiritual well-being are associated with perceived stress and can explain onechr('39')s attitude toward illness. Therefore, training patients to empower them in these areas have beneficial effects on their health-related quality of life.