Caring Behaviors, Spiritual, and Cultural Competencies: A Holistic Approach to Nursing Care
Authors: Soriano Gil , Aranas Febes Catalina , Tejada Rebecca Salud 
Published: February 2023

Holistic approach to nursing care is a comprehensive model which involves all facets of care which involves mental, spiritual, and social needs of patients. However, studies have shown that most nurses are not familiar with this model of caring and only considers the corporeal needs of the patient. Thus, the aim of the study was to assess the caring behaviors, spiritual and cultural competencies of nurses. Also, the extent of influence of cultural and spiritual competencies to the caring behaviors of Filipino nurses were determine. The study utilized a causal research design and a purposive sample of 124 Filipino medical-surgical nurses who were employed in Level 3 hospitals were included. The data were collected through survey using three (3) questionnaires which includes Nurse Cultural Competence Scale developed by Perng and Watson (2012), the Nurse Spiritual Care Therapeutic Scale developed by Mamier and Taylor(2014) and the Caring Nurse Patient Interaction Scale developed by Cossette et al. (2006). The data collected was analyzed using frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation and univariate linear regression analysis. The findings revealed that Filipino nurses rated themselves good in terms of spiritual and cultural competencies. Specifically, the subscales of cultural competencies which includes cultural skills, cultural knowledge and cultural sensitivity were also rated as good. On the other hand, the caring behaviors of Filipino nurses were rated as excellent. The same findings were also noted for two of its subscales, the clinical care and comforting care while both relational and humanistic care were rated as very good. Spiritual competencies showed a significant influence in the caring behaviors of nurses, however, no significant influence was noted between the cultural competencies and caring behaviors of nurses.
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