Religious coping and quality of life among individuals living with schizophrenia.

Objective: This study investigated the relationship between positive and negative religious coping and quality of life among outpatients with schizophrenia.

Methods: Interviews were conducted with 63 adults in the southeastern United States. Religious coping was measured by the 14-item RCOPE and quality of life by the World Health Organization Quality of Life–BREF.

Pilgrimage to wellness: an exploratory report of rural African American clergy perceptions of church health promotion capacity.

Churches serve vital roles in African American communities, where disease burden is disproportionately greater and healthcare access is more limited. Although church leadership often must approve programs and activities conducted within churches, little is known about their perception of churches as health promotion organizations, or the impact of church-based health promotion on their own health. This exploratory study assessed perceptions of church capacity to promote health among 27 rural, African American clergy leaders and report the relationship between their own health and that of their congregation.

Psychotropic medication claims among religious clergy.

This study examined psychotropic medication claims in a sample of Protestant clergy. It estimated the proportion of clergy in the sample who had a claim for psychotropic medication (i.e.

Religiosity is an important part of coping with grief in pregnancy after a traumatic second trimester loss.

Women (n = 15) who were pregnant after a traumatic late pregnancy loss (termination because of fetal death or serious anomalies) completed psychometric screening tests and scales, including the Perinatal Grief Scale (PGS), the Impact of Event Scale (IES), the Duke Depression Inventory (DDI), the Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD), and the Hoge Scale for Intrinsic Religiosity (IR). Despite a mean elapsed time since the prior loss of 27 (range, 7-47) months, half (7/15, 47%) of the combined groups had high levels of grief on the PGS. Multiple positive scores on psychometric tests were frequent: Sixty percent (9/15) had high scores on the PGS Active Grief subscale or on the IES.

The Clergy Occupational Distress Index (CODI): background and findings from two samples of clergy.

This study demonstrates the reliability and validity of the Clergy Occupational Distress Index (CODI). The five-item index allows researchers to measure the frequency that clergy, who traditionally have not been the subject of occupational health studies, experience occupational distress. We assess the reliability and validity of the index using two samples of clergy: a nationally representative sample of clergy and a sample of clergy from nine Protestant denominations.