Spirituality, Religiosity, and Health - Essay Sample

Spirituality, religiosity, and health are directly related. Various religiousness and spirituality levels are related to happiness, optimism, anxiety, depressive symptoms, and quality of life among adults. Many scholars have discovered that religiousness and spirituality are components of people's psychological well-being. Evidence has shown that there is a significant association between religious and spiritual low levels with mental impairment. On the one hand, spirituality is described as a sense of connection towards a more significant thing than the human perspective, which is concerned with searching for meaning in life (Cyphers et al., 2017). Therefore, spirituality applies to everyone in the universe, despite the race.

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On the other hand, religiosity is the constant involvement, participation, or interest in many forms of religious belief, dedication, and activity (Gonçalves et al., 2018). Researchers have gone ahead and describe how spirituality or religiosity contributes both positively and negatively to a person's health. This article analyses spirituality, religiosity, and health: a comparison of Physicians' Attitudes in Brazil, India, and Indonesia.

Lucchetti et al. (2016), the author of the article, states that people actively involved in religious or spiritual activities have better mental and physical health, lower mortality, and better quality of life. To support this statement, the author provides professional organizations such as the Association of American Medical Colleges, the American Nurses Association, the American Medical Association, and the American College of Physicians. The associations state that addressing and providing guidance on the spiritual and religious essentials is an essential element of health care, which many hospitals should embrace as part of clinical practice. Likewise, (Vitorino et al., 2018) states that health organizations have proved that high levels of religiosity and spirituality lead to mental and physical growth and better quality of life. Therefore, they recommend that clinical officers start addressing patient spiritual energy to achieve positive clinical results.

The author states that many physicians have acknowledged that managing and assessing their regular patients' spiritual needs has positively impacted the patients. Many patients who come to their physicians want to discuss their spiritual life. But there is a big challenge in this sector as many health professionals lack training on religiosity or spirituality in seldom assess and medical schools (Lucchetti et al., 2016). Therefore, a larger percentage of physicians cannot address the issue technically and with experience. Besides, countries from western religions such as Europe and North America have S/R studies, as many people are Christians. Research has also indicated that Buddhist, Hindu, and Muslim countries lack S/R studies, or they are few. The author is eager to know how patients and physicians from different communities deal with this issue. Therefore, research was carried out in three countries from two different continents between 2010 to 2012. These countries were Brazil, where 83% of the population considered religion necessary, India, where 80.5% were Hindus, 13.4% were Muslims, and 2.3% are Christians, and Indonesia, where 99.5% of the population considered religion necessary (Lucchetti et al., 2016).

The article provides a good discussion on the role of physicians in patient spiritual life. The study also shows that people with high spirituality and religiosity have no mental disorders and have a better quality of life. But the article offers no consensus on the models of spirituality. In contrast, some researchers have developed a partial consensus for religiousness, despite the desired interest in the study of S/R and health. To better understand how spirituality, religiosity, and health are related and whether S/R concepts are essential in clinical practices. The article fails to describe any variation between individuals with lower religiousness levels and higher spirituality levels in Brazil, Indonesia, or India. Other researchers, such as Puchalski, C. et al., (2012), have described that understanding practical differences between people with higher levels of spirituality and lower levels of religiousness helps the reader to understand the difference between different levels of religiosity and spirituality that elucidate the discussion and the concepts in the field. Other studies, such as (Cordero et al., 2018), have indicated which component is more critical in solving health issues. Such studies help the reader, and the physician understands which component is more critical in solving problems health-related than using both components. Besides, the article does not provide knowledge on the concept of "spiritual but not religious" and "religious but not spiritual."

In conclusion, higher levels of spirituality and religiosity contribute positively to mental and physical health. In comparison, lower levels of religiosity and spirituality contribute negatively to an individual's mental and physical health. This is evident through the article where a comparison is made in three different countries, Brazil, Indonesia, and India. An analysis of the impact of spiritual and religious growth was driven by comparing physicians' attitudes to the three countries. The article provides a clear discussion on how physicians attest to the importance of spiritual life to a patient. Physicians from the three countries stated that addressing the spiritual and religious life is essential in achieving a clinic's positive results. Still, the article does not provide a clear consensus of which component is more important than the other in solving health-related issues.

References

Cordero, R. de D., Romero, B. B., de Matos, F. A., Costa, E., Espinha, D. C. M., Tomasso, C. de S., Lucchetti, A. L. G., & Lucchetti, G. (2018). Opinions and attitudes on the relationship between spirituality, religiosity, and health: A comparison between nursing students from Brazil and Portugal. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 27(13–14), 2804–2813.

Cyphers, N. A., Clements, A. D., & Lindseth, G. (2017). The relationship between religiosity and health-promoting behaviors in pregnant women. Western Journal of Nursing Research, 39(11), 1429–1446.

Gonçalves, L. M., Tsuge, M. L. T., Borghi, V. S., Miranda, F. P., de Assis Sales, A. P., Lucchetti, A. L. G., & Lucchetti, G. (2018). Spirituality, religiosity, quality of life, and mental health among Pantaneiros: A study involving a vulnerable population in Pantanal Wetlands, Brazil. Journal of Religion and Health, 57(6), 2431–2443.

Lucchetti, G., Ramakrishnan, P., Karimah, A., Oliveira, G. R., Dias, A., Rane, A., Shukla, A., Lakshmi, S., Ansari, B. K., & Ramaswamy, R. S. (2016). Spirituality, religiosity, and health: A comparison of physicians’ attitudes in Brazil, India, and Indonesia. International Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 23(1), 63–70.

Puchalski, C. et al. (2009). Improving the quality of spiritual care as a dimension of palliative care: the Consensus Conference's report. Journal of palliative medicine 12, 885–904.

Vitorino, L., Lucchetti, G., Leão, F., Vallada, H., & Peres, M. (2018). The association betweenspirituality and religiousness and mental health. Scientific Reports, 8(1).