Positive Religious Coping and Associated Factors Among Participants with Severe Mental Illness Attending Felege Hiwot Comprehensive Specialized Hospital, Bahir Dar, Ethiopia, 2021

BACKGROUND: Religion has been reported to be the most widely used coping resource in stressful conditions including physical and mental illnesses. Different studies consistently find that positive religious coping is associated with a reduced level of severe mental illness such as depression. Despite its high prevalence and being a significant coping mechanism for persons with severe mental illness, there are no published studies on positive religious coping in Ethiopia. OBJECTIVE: To assess the prevalence of positive religious coping and associated factors among people with severe mental illness attending outpatient service at Felege Hiwot Comprehensive Specialized Hospital, Bahir Dar, northwest Ethiopia, 2021. METHODS: A cross-sectional institution-based study was conducted and systematic random sampling was applied to select participants. Data were collected through a face-to-face interview. The collected data were entered into EpiData version 3.1 and exported to SPSS version 20 for processing and analysis. Multivariable logistic regression was used to identify independent factors associated with religious coping. P-value <0.05 was declared a statistically significant association with a 95% confidence interval. RESULTS: The prevalence of positive religious coping among severe mental illness was 72.4% (95% CI= 68.2, 76.4). Having no comorbid medical illness, good quality of life, good medication adherence, and mild subjective severity scale were associated with positive religious coping. CONCLUSION: The magnitude of positive religious coping among severe mental illness was relatively high. Not having a comorbid medical illness, good medication adherence, good quality of life, and mild subjective severity scale were factors associated with it. Patients report different factors that affect practicing positive religious coping factors. In the other direction, positive religious coping was reported to contribute to symptom alleviating and increasing a sense of well-being.