Predictors of nurses’ spiritual care competence: A replication study with Australian palliative care nurses

OBJECTIVES: There is a growing need to enhance healthcare providers' spiritual care competence, including for people receiving palliative care. A preceding study of predictors of spiritual care competence in a general group of nurses found that more competent nurses rated significantly higher in spiritual training adequacy, frequency of spiritual care provision, and personal spirituality than other nurses; like the demographic variables of level of education, length of nursing experience, and sex, confidence and comfort in providing spiritual care were not related to spiritual care competence. The current study aimed to replicate these relationships in a sample of palliative care nurses. This sample also allowed the testing of a hypothesis that palliative care nurses will tend to subscribe to more competent understandings of spiritual care. METHODS: Data were collected from a convenience sample of Australian palliative care nurses who completed an anonymous, online survey. The survey provided qualitative data about what spiritual care means for them and quantitative data regarding nurse characteristics. The qualitative data were used to create sub-groups of nurses based on their understanding of spiritual care and the quantitative data were used to construct a profile of nurse characteristics for each sub-group. The replication analysis determined whether a statistical difference in nurse characteristics existed across sub-groups. The hypothesis testing compared levels of spiritual care understanding across the general and palliative care samples of nurses. RESULTS: While the results of the palliative care sample are largely concordant with those obtained in the general sample, the current study amends "training adequacy" as a predictor of spiritual care competence to "experience (whether on-the-job or training) in caring for the dying." The study hypothesis was supported. SIGNIFICANCE OF RESULTS: The results can be used to assess and develop competence in spiritual care for palliative care nurses.