Interventions by Hospital Nurses for the Spiritual Needs of Patients in the Eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey

Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study is to evaluate the spiritual care interventions of the nurses in hospitals. Subjects and Methods: Nurses employed in the 5 hospitals of Eastern Black Sea Region constitute the universe of the research that was planned to be descriptive. 1254 out of 1765 nurses were reached out between 1-30 May 2015 without a sample selection. The data were collected by the researchers is based on face‑to‑face survey techniques in which sociodemographic attributes built on literature and opinions on spiritual care were evaluated. Permission of the hospitals and nurses were obtained for the study. Number and percentage distributions and Chi‑square test were used for statistical analysis. Results: As the nurses’ sociodemographic attributes were examined, 29.3% of them belonged to 30–35 age group, 26% of them worked as a nurse manager for 82–161 months, and 56.7% of them worked for 162–300 months. Ninety‑one percent of them stated that they never practiced spiritual care‑related nursing, 97.5% of them stated that they never received support from hospital clergymen, 93.2% of them stated that they did not talk about spiritual need with the patient since they did not find it necessary. Conclusions: This study showed that there is very little or no interventions directed at the spiritual dimension during the patient’s caring process.

Keywords: Evaluation of intervention, nurse, patient, spiritual care, Turkey