Symptom Distress and Spiritual Well-Being in Patients with Cancer according to Illness and Treatment / 기본간호학회지

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: This study was done to analyze symptom distress and spiritual well-being in patients with cancer according cancer diagnosis, metastasis, treatment stage, number of hospitalizations and treatment modality. METHOD: The participants, 285 patients being treated in one of ten general hospitals either as in- or out-patients, completed the McCorkle and Young (1978) Symptom Distress Scale translated and adapted by Uhm (1986) and the Spiritual Well-Being Scale by Paloutzian and Ellison (1982) translated by Choi (1990). Data collection was done from June 19 to September 30, 2006. RESULTS: For symptom distress, there were significant differences for cancer diagnosis (p=.018), metastasis (p=.000), treatment stage (p=.000), number of hospitalizations (p=.000), and treatment modality (p=.002). For spiritual well-being, the only significant difference was for cancer diagnosis (p=.002). Patients with ovarian/uterine cancer had the lowest spiritual well-being. CONCLUSION: For patients with cancer, symptom distress was significantly different for illness and treatment factors, in particular, stage of illness, while for spiritual well-being, patients with uterine ovarian cancer had the lowest spiritual level. These results indicate a need to develop nursing interventions to decrease symptom distress in patients according to treatment stage and to promote spiritual well-being, particularly in women with ovarian/uterine cancer.