The Relationship between Spiritual Health and Uncertainty in Cancer Patients Having Chemotherapy

항암화학요법을 받는 암환자의 영적건강과 불확실성의 관계

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to provide the basic data for development of nursing intervention to decrease the uncertainty in cancer patients having chemotherapy through promoting their spiritual health and identifying the relationship between spiritual health and uncertainty. Method: 174 cancer patients who were admitted for chemotherapy at hospital were recruited from the 7th March to the 10th April, 2006. Two instruments have been used for this study. One was Highfield's Spiritual Health Inventory and the other was Mishel's MUIS(Mishel Uncertainty in Illness Scale). The collected data was analyzed by frequency, percentage, mean value, average mean, standard deviation, t-test, Scheffe's test, ANOVA and Pearson Correlation Coefficients with the SPSS PC 12.0 program. Results: The average mean value of the spiritual health $3.50{\pm}\;.48$ and the uncertainty was $1.91{\pm}\;.46$. It meant that the relationships between spiritual health and uncertainty were shown to have a moderately negative correlation(r=-.489, p= .000). This means that the greater is the spiritual health, the less is the patient's uncertainty. Conclusions: It was identified that cancer patients having chemotherapy had moderate spiritual health and uncertainty, and negative correlation between spiritual health and uncertainty. Therefore, it will be necessary for the development of spiritual nursing intervention strategies to relieve the uncertainty among cancer patients having chemotherapy.