Concept Analysis of Spiritual Care

Kang, Sung Rye

Abstract

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to identify attributes of the concept of spiritual care. METHOD: Walker and Avant's concept analysis framework was employed to review the clinical guidelines, nursing text books, and nursing research articles which were related to spiritual care and published from 1985 to 2005. RESULT: The attributes of the concept of spiritual care were a three stage process such as spiritual assessment, spiritual intervention, and spiritual evaluation. Spiritual care included three dimensions of relationships such as transpersonal, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. The quality of spiritual care was dependent upon characteristics of care-givers such as perception and knowledge of spiritual care, and the clinical environment. The antecedents of spiritual care was spiritual needs due to the prompt events. The consequence of spiritual care was spiritual well-being. CONCLUSION: This concept analysis of spiritual care contributed to promote performance of spiritual care in clinical fields by removing conceptual ambiguity and confirming the true meaning of spiritual care.