The benefits of prayer on mood and well-being of breast cancer survivors.
OBJECTIVE
Prayer is becoming more widely acknowledged as a way to cope with cancer. The goal of this study was to compare differences in use of prayer between breast cancer survivors from different ethnic groups and examine how use of prayer is related to mood and quality of life.


METHODS
This study used a mixed methods design. One hundred and seventy-five breast cancer survivors participated in a longitudinal study of survivorship. Women completed in-depth qualitative interviews and a battery of measures including quality of life, spirituality, social support, and mood.


RESULTS
Eighty-one percent of the women prayed. There were no significant differences between the groups for any of the psychological, social support, or quality of life variables with the exception of higher benefit finding and spiritual well-being among those who prayed. The data did show that women who prayed were able to find more positive contributions from their cancer experience than women who did not pray. The interviews showed that those who prayed tended to be African American or Asian, Catholic or Protestant. The prayers were for petitioning, comfort, or praise. Some of the women stated that they had difficulty praying for themselves.


CONCLUSIONS
While there seems to be few differences in terms of standardized measures of quality of life, social support, and mood between those who prayed and those who did not, the interviews showed that certain ethnic minority groups seem to find more comfort in prayer, felt closer to God, and felt more compassion and forgiveness than Caucasian women.
Levine
Ellen G
EG
Public Research Institute, Biobehavioral Research Center, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Ave PP750, San Francisco, CA 94132, USA. elevine@sfsu.edu
Aviv
Caryn
C
Yoo
Grace
G
Ewing
Cheryl
C
Au
Alfred
A
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000339:Affect; D000368:Aged; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D002140:California; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D011788:Quality of Life; D012067:Religion; D012944:Social Support; D029181:Spirituality; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D017741:Survivors / Q000523:psychology*