Psychometric properties of the Thai Spiritual Well-Being Scale

Cross-Cultural Evaluation of the Psychometric Properties of the Spiritual Well-Being Scale: A Systematic Review

Since spiritual well-being has a significant role in individual and social health, using a valid scale to identify these properties is essential. Comparing factor structure and differences in the number of dimensions and items of subscales could be an indicator of differences in individuals' attitudes toward spirituality among diverse cultures. The present review was performed for psychometric evaluation of the spiritual well-being measures. A systematic review of international databases and Iranian databases was conducted to evaluate studies published between January 1, 1970, and October 1, 2022. QUADAS-2, STARD, and COSMIN scales were used for risk of bias assessment. Following two rounds of screening, 14 articles entered quality assessment. According to the results, studies examining the factor structure of the spiritual well-being scale (SWBS) instrument have been conducted for the years 1998 to 2022. The mean age of the participants in these studies ranged from 20.8 to 79.08 years. During the process of exploratory factor analysis, the researchers reported the presence of two to five latent factors, and the range of explained variance was between 35.6 and 71.4%. However, most of the reports indicated the existence of two or three latent factors. The findings of the present study provide an image of the psychometric status of the SWBS for researchers and clinicians in this field and can help them make optimum decisions in selecting a scale or conducting additional psychometric studies or adopting this scale for studies in new populations.

Spiritual needs, spiritual well-being, and Buddhist practices of patients with terminal illness, Thailand

OBJECTIVES

The purposes of this study were to describe and compare the spiritual needs and spiritual well-being among terminally ill patients receiving care in different palliative care settings and to investigate the differences in spiritual well-being in relation to the level of Buddhist practices.

METHODS

A cross-sectional multicenter study was carried out that included community/home-based care (Home), a faith-based organization for patients with AIDS (FB_AIDS), a faith-based organization for patients with cancer (FB_CA), and a hospice ward (Hospice). Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the participants' demographics, Buddhist practices, spiritual needs, and spiritual well-being. The analysis was performed using analysis of variance and Kruskal-Wallis tests to compare the spiritual needs and the spiritual well-being in the different settings. The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to investigate the differences in spiritual well-being in relation to the level of Buddhist practices.

RESULTS

A total of 170 patients with a terminal illness (30 Home, 33 FB_AIDS, 64 FB_CA, and 43 Hospice) participated. Patients with a terminal illness receiving care at the FB_CA and Home had significantly higher mean scores for spiritual needs than those in the other settings. Patients with a terminal illness receiving care at the FB_CA had a significantly higher mean score for spiritual well-being than those receiving care in the other settings. Participants having a higher frequency of Buddhist practice had significantly higher mean scores for spiritual well-being.

SIGNIFICANCE OF RESULTS

Spiritual needs and spiritual well-being differed significantly among participants in different palliative care settings. The more the patients engaged in Buddhist practices, the higher their scores were for spiritual well-being. Thus, religious-based strategies should be integrated into palliative care and should be more emphasized.