Knowledge and perception on the importance of the spiritual dimension of care by Nursing Undergraduate Students

The acceptance of the existence of an extra-physical dimension, the spiritual, as a constituent part of human being has demanded from health professionals a reconsideration of the theoretical models that guide their professional practice, aiming at encompassing all dimensions of the complex human organism. This work aims to identify the perception of undergraduate Nursing students regarding the spiritual dimension in training activities. This is a descriptive-exploratory study. The sample was composed by 60 Nursing students from the fourth (20), sixth (20) and eighth (20) semesters that had accepted to participate in the study. Participation in training activities was the criterion for inclusion. For the collection of data, a half-structured questionnaire, composed of key-questions was applied that supplied elements for interpretation and reaching the proposed objectives. The students had been contacted in December 2006. Data had been worked by means of numbers and percentages. For this, the SPSS program, version 13.0 was used as database. The majority of the students (78.3%) did not recognize the importance of the spiritual dimension of patients. Students who recognized the importance of the spiritual dimension of patients (21.7%) had pointed the Chaplain as the main supplier of this assistance. Conversation and prayer had been the cited communicational expressions by more than half as the ways for caring for these necessities and 83% of subjects said Nursing must care for the Spiritual Dimension of patients.