Investigating the relationship between spiritual health and quality of life among elders in Iranshahr

Background and Objective: The issue of quality of life in current century has become a real challenge, especially for the elderly. Spiritual health is considered the newest aspect of health and causes the integration of other aspects of health (physical, mental and social). The present study was conducted to investigate the spiritual health and quality of life of elderly people in Iranshahr, Iran. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional and correlational study was conducted among 377 elderly people in Iranshahr who were selected by available sampling. Data were collected by Paloutzian and Ellison’s Spiritual Health Questionnaire and Quality of Life Questionnaire (SF36). Pearson correlation coefficient, and analysis of variance were used to analyze the data. The SPSS software version 19 was used to manage the data. Results: The mean scores of spiritual health and quality of life of the elderly people were 88.98 ± 7.35 and 58.2 ± 6.2, respectively. The quality of life of elderly women was significantly lower than elderly men (p = 0.03) and there was a positive relationship between spiritual health and quality of life of the elderlies (p = 0.03). Conclusion: According to the results of present study, it is necessary to consider the factors related to the quality of life in the care of elderly people. Also, the correlation between spiritual health and quality of life should be considered in the planning and policy-making related to health promotion of elderly population.