Senile Dementia from Neuroscientific and Islamic Perspectives

Religious Influences on the Experience of Family Carers of People with Dementia in a British Pakistani Muslim Community

This paper reports on a study that begins to address the paucity of research around the religious motivations of Muslim carers of family members with dementia. Seven carers were recruited for interviews from the British Pakistani Muslim community concentrated in the Midlands and North of England. Interview transcripts were analysed thematically using an iterative collaborative methodology. The findings suggested that the Muslim faith plays a pivotal role as a support mechanism for individual carers and their families, but the wider faith community and its leaders did not typically offer support and could impede access to external care. This was a result of cultural pressure and lack of awareness both among religious leaders and the community as a whole. The study concluded that the inequality in access to dementia services may be constructively addressed if service providers engage with these faith concerns in the community and religious leaders to meet the needs of Muslims of British Pakistani origin.

Islam and Mental Disorders of the Older Adults: Religious Text, Belief System and Caregiving Practices

This paper illustrates the impact of Islamic religious texts on dementia care in the Middle East. It examines how old age and older adults mental disorders are framed in the Quran and Hadith, and how these texts are transformed to belief ideologies and caregiving practices. The study uses a qualitative research methods, which include a review of all Islamic holy texts that address mental and cognitive changes associated with ageing, along with interviews with eight Sharia scholars and 37-Arab-Muslim families living in Qatar. Islamic texts command compassion and honouring of elderly parents and give care instructions. These texts are transformed into social practices and used as diagnostic and treatment tools.

Pornography Consumption and Attitudes Towards Pornography Legality Predict Attitudes of Sexual Equality

Some scholars argue that the existence of pornography is an ongoing assault on women and that it should be banned. However, the existing evidence suggests the connection between pornography consumption and sexism is overstated and may actually run in the opposite direction. Using data from the General Social Survey (2010-2018), the current study investigated if "pornography consumption" and "pornography tolerance" predicted sexism and whether these associations varied by sex. Results indicated that pornography consumption predicted lower levels of sexism, although these effects were rendered nonsignificant with the inclusion of sociodemographic, religious, and sociocultural covariates. When comparing the results of the current study to findings based on data from the 1970s-1990s, it appears that pornography consumption is now irrelevant to sexism rather than promoting egalitarianism. Our analyses focusing on "pornography tolerance" revealed that people who supported regulated pornography were more egalitarian than people who supported a pornography ban. Generally, men were more likely to report sexist attitudes than women, but sex moderated the relationship that pornography variables had with sexism in several of the models. Overall, pornography consumption and pornography tolerance were either irrelevant in predicting sexism or were associated with greater egalitarianism.

Experiences of People With Dementia in Pakistan: Help-Seeking, Understanding, Stigma, and Religion

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

The prevalence of dementia will increase in low- and middle-income countries like Pakistan. Specialist dementia services are rare in Pakistan. Public awareness of dementia is low, and norms about family care can lead to stigma. Religion plays a role in caregiving, but the interaction between dementia and Islam is less clear.

RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS

Qualitative interviews were carried out with 20 people with dementia in Karachi and Lahore. Interviews were conducted in Urdu, translated to English, and respondents' views on help-seeking experiences, understanding of diagnosis, stigma, and religion were analyzed thematically.

RESULTS

Although some people with dementia understood what dementia is, others did not. This finding shows a more positive perspective on diagnosis in Pakistan than previously thought. Help-seeking was facilitated by social and financial capital, and clinical practice. Stigma was more common within the family than in the community. Dementia symptoms had a serious impact on religious obligations such as daily prayers. Participants were unaware that dementia exempts them from certain religious obligations.

DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATIONS

Understanding of dementia was incomplete despite all participants having a formal diagnosis. Pathways to help-seeking need to be more widely accessible. Clarification is needed about exemption from religious obligations due to cognitive impairment, and policy makers would benefit from engaging with community and religious leaders on this topic. The study is novel in identifying the interaction between dementia symptoms and Islamic obligatory daily prayers, and how this causes distress among people living with dementia and family caregivers.

The Effectiveness of Spiritual Therapy on Spiritual Well-Being, Self-Esteem and Self-Efficacy in Patients on Hemodialysis

Spirituality is an important part of practice of the healthcare providers. Spiritual therapy is important for patients with chronic and end-stage diseases such as end-stage renal disease due to changes in physical, mental, social and spiritual needs. Promotion of spiritual well-being, self-esteem and self-efficacy is very important for these patients. The aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of spiritual therapy on spiritual well-being, self-esteem and self-efficacy in patients on hemodialysis. The quasi-experimental research design was pre-posttest with the control group. The statistical population was the patients on hemodialysis in Governmental Hospital of Shahid Mostafa in Ilam, Iran, in 2015. Twenty-four patients were entered to the study by convenience sampling. They were divided into experimental and control groups randomly. Twelve 60-min sessions of spiritual therapy were held for the experimental group twice a week. The tools included spiritual well-being scale of Paloutzian and Ellison, Self Esteem Inventory of Cooper Smith and Self-Efficacy Scale of Sherer. Data were analyzed by SPSS software through descriptive and inferential statistics (analysis of covariance). p Values < 0.05 were considered significant. Results indicated that the scores in the experimental group changed in spiritual health from 39.32 ± 3.38 to 43.40 ± 2.82, in self-esteem from 42.65 ± 2.61 to 45.90 ± 3.88 and in self-efficacy from 40.99 ± 2.19 to 44.65 ± 2.58 which was significant compared with the control group (p = 0.01). Spiritual therapy can be used as an effective intervention to improve spiritual well-being, self-esteem and self-efficacy in patients on hemodialysis. This intervention is directed to holistic care. It can be done by interdisciplinary participation in caring and psychological teams.