Including the 'Spiritual' Within Mental Health Care in the UK, from the Experiences of People with Mental Health Problems

The Journey From Drug Addiction to Drug Withdrawal: A Christian Gospel Rehabilitation Program in Taiwan

BACKGROUND

World Drug Report estimates the number of opioid users at 53 million and identifies opioids as responsible for two thirds of the 585,000 people who died as a result of drug use in 2017.

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to analyze the testimonies of 30 people regarding their journeys from drug addiction to drug withdrawal in Taiwan.

METHODS

This was a qualitative research design. The sample inclusion criteria were as follows: (a) being a drug abuser, (b) completed the Christian Gospel Drug Withdrawal Program or church-sponsored program, and (c) shared their related testimony on the Good TV television channel in Taiwan. The participants' stories were posted in Chinese, transcribed by the author, and translated from Chinese into English. Content analysis was used to identify the major themes.

RESULTS

Of the 30 participants, 24 were male (80%) and six were female (20%). The major themes identified in their testimonies were: (a) Using illegal drugs related to peer recognition, lack of knowledge, and temptations; (b) drug addiction was an endless pain cycle; (c) turning points related to love, repentance, and hope; (d) drug withdrawal was related to avoiding temptation and overcoming the drug withdrawal syndrome through the Holy Spirit; and (e) outcomes were faith and new life.

CONCLUSIONS/IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

In this study, people who received the gospel drug withdrawal programs expressed that their lives had changed, they had withdrawn from drugs successfully, they had become volunteers to help others, and interactions with their family had improved. These programs may be applied in the mental health nursing profession.

The relationship between psychiatric nurses' spiritual care practices, perceptions and their competency

PURPOSE

The research aimed to examine the relationship between psychiatric nurses' spiritual care practices, perceptions and competencies.

METHODS

This study was conducted as a descriptive -correlational study. The population of the study consisted of the nurses working at Manisa Mental Health Hospital (N =134). It was intended to contact the whole of the population, and so there was no selection process. Thus, the study sample consisted of 128 nurses, who accepted to participate in the research. Spirituality Spiritual Care Rating Scale used to determine nurses' perceptions spirituality and spiritual care. Spiritual Care Competence Scale was used to evaluate the nurses' spiritual care competence.

RESULTS

Spirituality and Spiritual Care Rating Scale of psychiatric nurses item score mean was 3.93 ± 0.49, the Spiritual Care Competence Scale of psychiatric nurses item score mean was 3.54 ± 0.63. There was no significant relationship between two scales (p > 0.05). As a result of multiple regression analysis, psychiatric nurses' which accounts for only 20.1% of spirituality and spiritual care perceptions of feel incompetent about spiritual care.

CONCLUSION

Psychiatric nurses' perceptions of spiritual and spiritual care were high, but their competence was at a moderete level. There was no a correlation between nurses' perceptions and competencies of spiritual care.

The Effect of Spirituality on the Subjective Recovery of Psychiatric Patients

Spiritual well-being is among the factors that affect subjective recovery. This study aimed to explore the relationship between subjective recovery and spiritual well-being among psychiatric patients and to identify the factors that affected their subjective recovery. A descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted with 96 patients admitted to the psychiatry clinic of a hospital. It was found that the patients had high subjective recovery assessment levels and medium levels of spiritual well-being. There was a positive association between the patients' subjective recovery assessments and their spiritual well-being, and spiritual well-being was a significant predictor of the subjective recovery level. It is recommended that mental health professionals focus on serving patients through a holistic healthcare approach and enhancing patients' subjective recovery levels through applications that will strengthen the spiritual dimension.

Spiritual needs among Koreans and Americans with advanced chronic illnesses: A cultural comparison

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

This study aimed to measure the frequency of spiritual needs, identify the factors associated with these needs among Korean and American persons living with an advance chronic illness and compare them from a cross-cultural perspective.

BACKGROUND

Persons with serious or life-limiting illnesses often have spiritual needs. Unmet spiritual needs are associated with poor well-being and threaten psychological health. Little is known about how specific spiritual needs vary across cultures.

DESIGN

A quantitative, cross-sectional, observational cross-cultural comparison was undertaken.

METHODS

The study has been prepared in accordance with the STROBE guidelines. Convenience sampling was used to recruit participants from outpatient clinics in South Korea and Southern California (N = 202). Spiritual needs were measured using the Spiritual Interests Related to Illness Tool (SpIRIT); demographic and illness-related variables were also assessed using paper-and-pencil questionnaires. Data were analysed using various parametric statistical tests, including multiple regression analysis.

RESULTS

The findings quantify the intensity and types of spiritual needs that persons living with an advanced chronic illness experience. Furthermore, they show how the spiritual needs of religiously diverse samples of South Koreans and Americans differ. The findings also indicate that self-reported spirituality and religiosity independently explain a substantial amount of the variance in spiritual needs.

CONCLUSIONS

In both the samples, spiritual needs were reported and associated with spirituality and religiosity. Although all the eight domains of spiritual needs assessed by the SpIRIT were pertinent to the Korean and American samples, they were prioritised differently.

RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE

Screening patients to ascertain how important spirituality or religiosity is to them may help clinicians focus their in-depth assessments on those who report high levels of spirituality or religiosity because these patients may experience the strongest spiritual needs. The SpIRIT shows promise as a measure of diverse spiritual needs.

Valuing e-inclusion: Social media and the social networks of adolescents with intellectual disability

BACKGROUND

Social media is a growing phenomenon, yet people with intellectual disability (ID) may not experience comparable access to this communication technology. Adolescents with ID may benefit from e-inclusion, especially as individuals with ID are at risk of having smaller social networks.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The Social Network Guide was adapted to measure social media usage and used to examine the interpersonal relationships of adolescents with and without ID.

RESULTS

Adolescents with ID held smaller social networks with less developed informal relationships. However, friendship quality was comparable or superior to typically developing peers. Adolescents with ID interacted with a smaller percentage of contacts using social media. Social media use was predictive of the number of reported friendships and did not significantly predict critical comments.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest that adolescents with ID have comparable access to social media but use these sites to interact with a smaller number of social contacts.

Path Analysis Testing the Development of Personality and Psychological Well-being Model

The purpose of this study was to test the development of personality and psychological well-being model. This was a cross-sectional, descriptive design. The 448 participants were recruited from older adults living in a Midwest community in the United States. After Institution of Research Board approval, the trained researchers explained this study to older adults who lived in the community. After agreeing to participate, they signed an informed consent form. The structured questionnaires were used to perform data collection. Path analysis was used to examine this model. SPSS 23 version was employed to examine the instruments' reliabilities and descriptive data. In this model, family interaction and spiritual well-being had significant influences on personality, which had a significant influence on selecting coping strategies. Using different coping strategies influenced on the outcome variables (e.g., psychological well-being and suicidal ideation). The family interaction and spiritual well-being played a critical role on the outcome variables.

A 'near-life experience': lived experiences of spirituality from the perspective of people who have been subject to inpatient psychiatric care

AIMS

To describe lived experiences of spirituality from the perspective of people who have been subject to inpatient psychiatric care and to interpret these experiences from an understanding of health as dialectical.

METHODS

After approval from a regional ethical board, eleven participants were recruited from two organisations for people with mental health problems. Participants were asked to narrate about spiritual experiences and occasions where such experiences had come close. The transcribed interviews were analysed by means of a phenomenological hermeneutical approach.

FINDINGS

A structural analysis of the text resulted in three themes; perceiving the presence of something extra mundane, making sense of reality and struggling for acceptance. The comprehensive understanding highlights spiritual experiences as going beyond religion, even though religious experiences appear as part of it. These experiences can indeed be a resource contributing to experiences of hope, connectedness, meaning and coherence in life. However, they can also give rise to doubt, anxiety and feelings of loneliness and hopelessness. Rather than understanding spiritual experiences as being either 'good' or 'bad', we could approach spirituality as something that is always present in alternate and inter-related forms. Metaphorically, this could be understood as a 'near-life experience', summarising participants' experiences related to their struggle with issues related to suffering and health which are simultaneously present.

CONCLUSIONS

If psychiatric nurses could approach this complexity and, without being judgemental, explore seemingly positive and negative experiences of spirituality as dialectically related to each other, rather than viewing them as either resources or problems, this could contribute to insiderness care and hopefully also support people who struggle with these experiences to seek help when needed.

Spiritual Perspectives, Spiritual Care, and Knowledge of Recovery Among Psychiatric Mental Health Nurses

BACKGROUND: Promoting spiritual well-being aids the mental health recovery process. Furthermore, nursing governance bodies and national mental health care regulators support spiritual care as a mental health-promoting approach. Although spiritual well-being is integral to quality of life in people with mental illness, little is known about the psychiatric mental health (PMH) nurses' provision of spiritual care. AIMS: Spiritual perspectives, frequency of spiritual care, and knowledge of recovery-oriented practice were measured. Variables were explored to identify a model of spiritual care. METHOD: A descriptive correlational cross-sectional design was employed. Analyses of data using descriptive statistics, correlations, and hierarchical multiple regression were conducted with a convenience sample of 171 PMH nurses. RESULTS: Participants scored high on measurement of spiritual perspectives, moderate on measurement of knowledge about recovery-oriented practice, and indicated a moderate degree of frequency of provision of spiritual care. Nurses who viewed themselves as "spiritual and religious" provided more frequent spiritual care and had higher levels of spiritual perspectives than those who viewed themselves as "spiritual but not religious." Significant contributors to spiritual care were spiritual perspectives and years of experience as a PMH nurse. Knowledge of recovery-oriented practice, however, did not contribute to a model of spiritual care. CONCLUSIONS: Nurses' spiritual perspectives, religiosity, and years of experience are factors that may explain nurse-provided spiritual care. Findings imply that spiritual and/or religious development may support PMH nurses to provide spiritual care.

Who Can Provide Spiritual Counseling? A Qualitative Study from Iran

Background and Aim:

Given the increased prevalence of mental illnesses in recent years, many therapists and researchers use spiritual counseling (SC), which is one of the spiritual interventions. However, unfortunately, the use of this intervention by the therapists is nonscientific because the ambiguities of this issue are high in the mental health field of Iran. The aim of this study is to survey the following most important challenges: what groups are qualified to provide SC, what kind of knowledge should be known by suitable individuals, who can train spiritual counselors, what they should teach, and what teaching methods should be used.

Methods:

The present conventional qualitative content analysis used deep semi-structured interview to collect data from the view of stakeholders. A total of 15 people were selected through purposive sampling. After transcription of the interviews, the data were analyzed based on the Graneheim and Lundman model.

Results:

Results obtained from data analysis covered five main themes including SC candidates, general conditions, sciences required, SC curriculum, and spiritual counselors' training method.

Conclusions:

The present study has answered to the most basic questions in SC scope. Since spiritual services are rooted in our culture and religion, native guidelines should be created for them as soon as possible through conducting similar qualitative researches. Furthermore, it is worth considering teaching and training case in this scope to make spiritual service providers concern about solutions to promote these services.