The physical therapist-patient relationship. Does physical therapist' occupational stress affect patients' quality of life?

Our pilot study investigated the patient-physical therapist relationship. Physical therapists see and are actively involved in the consequences of and the improvements in patients' health status. This close involvement, together with their own expectations, renders physical therapists vulnerable to different kinds of stress. The aim of this study was to investigate whether physical therapists' occupational stress is related to patients' perceived quality of life. Eight patient-physical therapist pairs were enrolled. The following measures were administered to the participants: Occupational Stress Indicator (OSI); World Health Organization Quality of Life-Brief (WHOQoL-Brief); Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS). Our study demonstrated the existence of different kinds of relationship between physical therapists' occupational stress (measured by OSI) and patients' perceived quality of life (measured by WHOQoL-Brief). It was found that patients' quality of life and therefore outcome are affected by the possible presence of physical therapists' occupational stress. Our study identified traits (both personal and professional) in physical therapists that positively affect patients' perceived quality of life.

Italian validation of the Royal Free Interview for Religious and Spiritual Beliefs.

Interest in the relevance of religion and spirituality to medicine is growing and concerns the possible association between religiousness, spirituality and well-being. In the rehabilitation field these factors may affect outcome. We translated the "Royal Free Interview for Religious and Spiritual Beliefs" into Italian and validated the Italian language version. The translation the Royal Free Interview was accomplished in several steps. Certain adaptations were necessary in order to take into account certain peculiarities of the Italian language and of the Italian-speaking world. The Italian translation presented in this study shows internal consistency: Cronbach's alpha coefficient 0.82 (spiritual scale) and 0.80 (philosophical scale) in the 53 healthy volunteers; alpha coefficient 0.79 (spiritual scale) and 0.64 (philosophical scale) in the stroke patients. Test-retest reliability, evaluated by means of the intraclass correlation coefficient, was 0.83 (spiritual scale) and 0.99 (philosophical scale). There are two main reasons why an Italian translation of a religious coping scale was deemed necessary: i) there is a growing awareness of the possible impact of faith on stress and on the outcome of many disabling diseases; ii) Italy has a large and aging population and thus a high prevalence of disabled patients.