Abstract:

Background: Caregivers are at a key point in the palliative care process. Both palliative care patients and caregivers need spiritual support. There is no study in the literature on the effect of spiritual well-being and self-transcendence level on care burden. Today, it is stated that although the necessity of meeting the spiritual needs of caregivers is known, these needs are not addressed because they are multifaceted and difficult to measure.

Aim: This study aims to examine the effect of spiritual well-being and self-transcendence levels of caregivers of palliative care patients on the burden of care.

Method: This descriptive study was completed with 101 palliative caregivers. Self-compassion scale, spiritual well-being scale and descriptive information form were used to collect the data. The data were collected from caregivers who had patients hospitalised in the palliative care service. Descriptive statistics, correlation and logistic regression analyses were used to evaluate the data. Ethics committee approval was obtained before starting the study. Bu çalışma Ondokuz Mayis Üniversitesi Bilimsel Araştırmalar Komisyonu tarafından “PYO.SBF.1904.23.008” koduyla desteklenmiştir.

Findings: The participants’ competence to care for their patients was analysed with a scale evaluated on a 10-point scale, and the mean competence score was found to be 6.9±2.0.

The distribution of the mean scores of the participants from the spiritual well-being scale and its sub-dimensions and the self-transcendence scale is given below. It was found that the total score of the spiritual well-being scale was 117.1±15.1 and the total score of the self-transcendence scale was 47.5±7.5. It was found that there was a significant positive relationship between the participants’ spiritual well-being and self-transcendence levels (r=.538, p<0.001). It was determined that as the self-transcendence levels of the participants increased, their spiritual well-being would increase. In the project, it was found that 28.9% of spiritual well-being could be explained by self-transcendence (R2=.289, p<0.001).

Conclusions: In the project, it was found that self-transcendence had an effect on the spiritual well-being of caregivers of palliative care patients.