ArticleHealth psychology and behavioral medicine2020
'Maybe we are losing sight of the human dimension' - physicians' approaches to existential, spiritual, and religious needs among patients with chronic pain or multiple sclerosis. A qualitative interview-study.
Article in Health psychology and behavioral medicine, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed.
- Existential Well-Being Mediates the Relationship Between Religious Well-Being and Mental Health as Well as Quality of Life in Polish Chronic Pain Patients: Longitudinal Pilot Study.Journal of religion and health · 2026Article
- Spirituality in occupational therapy practice: A scoping review with narrative synthesis.The British journal of occupational therapy · 2025Review
- Addressing client spirituality in occupational therapy practice: A qualitative study.Australian occupational therapy journal · 2025Review
- Spiritual care competencies among nursing students in the middle East and Asia: a systematic review.BMC nursing · 2025Article
- Improving Spiritual Well-Being of Polish Pain Outpatients: A Feasibility Mixed Methods Study.Journal of clinical medicine · 2024Article
- Regaining Autonomy in a Holding Environment: Patients' Perspectives on the Existential Communication with Physicians When Suffering from a Severe, Chronic Illness: A Qualitative Nordic Study.Journal of religion and health · 2023Article
- [Chronic pain as an existential challenge].Schmerz (Berlin, Germany) · 2023Article
- Spiritual Needs Assessment in Post-Secular Contexts: An Integrative Review of Questionnaires.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Review
- The Process of Spiritual Care.Frontiers in psychology · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveResearch suggests that existential, spiritual, and religious issues are important for patient's psychological adjustment when living with chronic pain and multiple sclerosis. However, there is a paucity of studies investigating how physicians experience and approach these patients' needs.
designPhysicians' experiences with and approaches to existential, spiritual, and religious needs when treating chronic pain or multiple sclerosis were studied in eight semi-structured interviews and analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA).
resultsPhysicians found that only few patients had spiritual and religious needs; however, they experienced that every patient were struggling with existential challenges related to the illness and rooted in a changed identity and approaching death. How the physicians approached these needs appeared to be influenced by six conditions: Their medical culture, training, role, experiences of time pressure, their personal interests, and interpersonal approach.
conclusionPhysicians' training seems better suited to meet biomedical objectives and their patients' concrete needs than patients' wish for a relational meeting focused on their subjective lifeworld. This challenge is discussed in relation to modern patient-centeredness, doctor-patient relationship, culturally constructed experiences of privacy, and future clinical practice and research needs.
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