Espiritualidade e saúde mental e geral nos idosos institucionalizados

Abstract

The study of spirituality and its relationship to mental and general health, especially associated with aging, is still very scarce nationwide. Thus, this study aims to evaluate the relationship between spirituality and general and mental health in institutionalized elderly. This is a quantitative research, observational, descriptive and correlational and cross-sectional between -subjects. The sample consisted of 55 elderly users of the Santa Casa de Misericórdia de Braga (SCMB), of both genders, aged 55 to 99 years. The instruments used were the Spirituality Assessment Scale (EE), the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI), the Short-Form Health Survey (MOS SF - 36v2) and a complementary socio-demographic questionnaire. The results show that we have a sample of subjects with high spirituality without psychopathological problems and satisfactory physical health, and the lower dimensions were emotional development and physical functioning. In addition, we found a statistically significant negative association between dimensions of spirituality and the BSI and a significant positive association between dimensions of spirituality and social functioning of the SF -36. Finally, compared to the variation of the results of spirituality in relation to sociodemographic variables, we found that women had significantly higher results in the two dimensions, older people have significantly higher results in dimension beliefs and seniors who have not been to school but can read/write also feature superior results in that dimension. There were no differences according to marital status. Since this is a subject little studied in Portugal, we hope to have contributed to the deepening of knowledge in this area and that new studies continue to focus on the same, so we can develop interventions increasingly effective and targeted programs to promote welfare for the elderly and a process of healthy aging.

Date of Award	18 Jul 2014
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Eleonora C. V. Costa (Supervisor)