Relationship Between Spiritual Health and Quality of Life in Patients with Multiple Sclerosis

Introduction: Multiple sclerosis is one of the most common and debilitating diseases of the central nervous system which leads to neuronal (myelin) disruption (1). It is estimated that about two million people worldwide suffer from this disease (2, 3). In this regard, this study aimed to explore the relationship between spiritual well-being and the quality of life in the MS patients who referred to the Baghyatallah clinic. Materials and Methods: This descriptive study was performed on 80 patients within the age range of 16-60 years who had referred to the Baghyatallah MS clinic during 2017. The required data were collected through the Spiritual Well-Being Scale, Academy of Medical Sciences Questionnaire, and Multiple Sclerosis Impact Scale (MSIS-29). Moreover, the collected data were analyzed using independent t-test and Pearson correlation coefficient. It should be noted that a p-value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Based on the findings, the mean age of the subjects was 9.99±35.33 years and almost 70% of them were female. Furthermore, the results indicated that the mean scores of the physical and psychological aspects of the quality of life were 39.76±16.20 and 48.35±13.30, respectively. In addition, the spiritual health score was reported at 91.79±5.30 based on the Academy of Medical Sciences Questionnaire. The results also showed that an increase in spiritual health led to a significant increase in physical (P=0.002) and psychological (P=0.017) aspects of well-being based on the Spiritual Well-Being Scale which, in turn, led to an improvement in the quality of life. Therefore, the findings from the Academy of Medical Sciences Questionnaire revealed that there was a statistically significant relationship between the spiritual well-being and quality of life of MS patients. Conclusion: According to the results, it can be concluded that there is a necessity to improve spiritual health as a factor that affects the quality of life of MS patients. This key finding could be useful and necessary in designing care-therapy programs for such patients in a country with the intellectual, cultural, and religious beliefs of Iran.