Background and Purpose: Belief in God and hope play an important
role in the lives of all the members of the society, particularly in the lives of
the patients. Regardig this, the aim of the present study was to compare the
role of religious beliefs in hopefulness and quality of life among the cancer
and non-cancer patients in Shiraz, Iran in 2011.
Materials and Methods: This case-control comparative study was
conducted on 60 patients referring to the Namazi Hospital in Shiraz.
Therefore, the study population corresponded to two groups of 30 (i.e., 15
males and 15 females in each gorup) cancer and non-cancer patients
referring to the Chemotherapy Unit and other units, respectively, through
simple random sampling method. The data were collected using the
religious beliefs (2006), hopefulness (1991), and brief quality of life
questionnaires (1996). The data analysis was performed using the
descriptive and inferential statistics (independent t-test) through the SPSS 16.
Results: According to the results of the study, there were statistically
significant differences between the cancer and non-cancer patients in terms
of the religious beliefs, hopefulness, and quality of life.
Conclusion: As the findigns of the present study indicated, the religious
beliefs could improve the mental condition of the cancer patients resulting
in increased life expectancy and quality of life in these patients.