Relationship between spirituality, meaning in life, psychological distress, wish for hastened death, and their influence on quality of life in palliative care patients (original) (raw)

2017, Journal of pain and symptom management

Spiritual, existential, and psychological issues represent central components of quality of life (QOL) in palliative care. A better understanding of the dynamic underlying these components is essential for the development of interventions tailored to the palliative context. The aims were to explore (i) the relationship between spirituality, meaning in life, wishes for hastened death and psychological distress in palliative patients, and (ii) the extent to which these non-physical determinants influence QOL. A cross-sectional study involving face-to-face interviews with Swiss palliative patients was performed, including the Schedule for Meaning in Life Evaluation (SMILE), the Spiritual Subscale of the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy (FACIT-Sp), the Idler Index of Religiosity (IIR), the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and the Schedule of Attitudes toward Hastened Death (SAHD). QOL was measured with a single item visual analogue scale (0-10). 206 patients ...