Spiritual care for older people living in the community: A scoping review

Abstract

Background

The population of older people should be supported to enjoy optimal quality of life. Health professionals should consider a range of interventions that support the older population to maintain their quality of life. One such interventional approach involves spiritual care.

Objective

To explore what is known about spiritual care approaches for older people living in the community.

Methods

Scoping review informed by Joanna Briggs Institute guidelines. Eight electronic databases were searched: CINAHL, Ageline, PubMed, ProQuest Nursing & Allied Health, PsycINFO, Scopus, Garuda, and Neliti. The review included quantitative and qualitative primary peer-reviewed research studies focusing on spiritual care interventions for older people living in the community published between 2011 and 2021 in English or Bahasa Indonesia. The search was uploaded into an electronic citation manager and imported into Covidence for screening.

Results

A total of 29 studies were included in the review. While the studies were conducted in five continents, most were reported from the Asian continent. Five key issues based on the outcome of interventions were found namely psychological, physical, spiritual, multidisciplinary approach, and social connection.

Conclusion

This scoping review identifies spiritual interventions conducted across many countries have been implemented for older people living in the community. Although there are review limitations and further research is needed, these spiritual interventions, both faith-based and non-faith-based, are identified as useful to support the well-being of older people.

Keywords:

• spiritual intervention
• aging
• spirituality
• health
• older adult
• community

Acknowledgements

Furthermore, we want to acknowledge Dr. Sue Gilbert, senior librarian at La Trobe University, for her support and assistance in designing the search strategy.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplemental data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/10376178.2024.2310260.

Additional information

Funding

This PhD study is supported by ‘Beasiswa Kemenag-LPDP’ (Ministry of Religious Affair Republic of Indonesia-Indonesia Endowment Fund for education) MORA-Kemenag RI.