Effect of Spiritual Group Therapy on Depression, Anxiety and Stress of the Mothers of Children With Cancer

Abstract

Objective: Caring for children with cancer has many tensions that can lead to deep emotional and emotional problems such as stress, anxiety and depression in their caregivers. This study aims to examine the effect of spiritual group therapy on depression, anxiety and stress of the mothers of children with cancer. Methods: The is a quasi-experimental study with a pre-test/post-test design conducted on 24 mothers as caregivers of children with cancer selected from among those in the children’s cancer association in Ardebil, Iran. They were divided into two groups of intervention and control. The intervention group participated in 8 sessions of spiritual group therapy. Depression, anxiety and stress were evaluated before and after intervention using the 42-item Depression Anxiety Stress Scale. Data were analyzed using Chi-square test, independent t-test, paired t-test, Mann-Whitney U test, and Wilcoxon test in SPSS v. 25 software. Results: Mean±SD age of mothers in the intervention and control groups was 39.08±8.56 and 38.09±9.76 years, respectively. The results showed that the spiritual group therapy could significantly decrease depression (P=0.001), stress (P=0.001) and anxiety (P=0.001) in mothers. Conclusion: Spiritual group therapy can reduce stress, anxiety and depression of mothers as caregivers of children with cancer. The development of such programs is recommended for alleviating the psychological problems in caregivers of children with cancer and, thus, maintaining or improving the quality of care provided by them to the children.