The relationship between the strength of religious faith and spirituality and the level of acceptance of illness in a group of patients under home palliative care. Part 3. Spirituality and its conditioning, as well as the impact on the acceptance of illness

Introduction
Understanding spirituality and its dimensions in patients having in-home hospice care, and determining the relationship between spirituality and the level of acceptance of a disease.

Material and methods
The research material was collected using a diagnostic survey method among 106 patients covered by home hospice care by the Private Health Care Centre in Radom. The survey questionnaire consisted of two standardised tools: Spiritual Attitudes and Commitment – SAIL and Scale for Acceptance of Disease – AIS, and metrics.

Results
In the studied population, the highest average spirituality score was obtained in the Connectedness with nature subscale (M = 5.12; SD = 0.6), while the lowest-rated dimension of spirituality was Transcendent experiences (M = 3.72; SD = 1.03). The level of disease acceptance in the studied group of patients under home hospice care should be defined as an average (M = 25.42; SD = 6.43). Analysis concerning the correlation of individual subscales of spiritual attitudes and involvement showed significant positive correlation of all six subscales with the level of disease acceptance (p ≤ 0.001).

Conclusions
In the studied group of patients, the highest-rated dimension of spirituality was Connectedness with nature, then Trust and Spiritual activity. The following dimensions were slightly lower: Significance/value of life, Resourcefulness, and Transcendental experiences. The examined variables that significantly differentiated the assessment in individual dimensions of spirituality were age, place of residence, education, marital status, the number of people living with the patient in a shared household, the time of taking home hospice care, and attitude towards faith. In conclusion, when the assessment of each of the six dimensions of spirituality increases, the level of acceptance of the disease also rises amongst the researched patients under home hospice care.