The effect of spiritual intelligence training on the hope and self-transcendence in mothers of premature neonates

Background and aim: Spiritual intelligence training, as one dimension of comprehensive care and a means of communicating with a higher power (God), can increase mothers' hope and self-transcendence.Method: This randomized clinical trial study included 80 mothers with premature infants hospitalized in the NICU in Iran in 2019. The permutation blocks method was used to randomly divide the participants, who were selected based on the inclusion criteria, into intervention and control groups. Weekly training sessions were held in a hybrid of virtual and face-to-face formats over the course of eight sessions (90 minutes per session) for intervention group and the control group did not received any education. The maternal demographic and neonatal clinical characteristics questionnaire, the "hope scale of mothers with premature neonates”, and the “Self-Transcendence Scale” were used for data gathering.Results: The mean ages of the participants in the intervention and control groups were 30.18±3.76 and 29.38±1.52 years, respectively and about 45.2 percent of neonates were first child. The results of repeated-measures ANOVA showed that after spiritual intelligence training, the mean scores of self-transcendence (51.42±1.81) and hope (160.10±7.75) significantly increased in the intervention group (P-value<0.001).Implications for practice: By using mechanisms that can increase the mother’s hope and self- transcendence, it is possible to ensure that they provide quality and comprehensive care, infect allowing them to better perform the parent role.