Superstitious Beliefs Among Healthcare Providers: A Concept Analysis

Abstract

Evidence-based practice is a problem-solving approach to healthcare delivery that reflects the best current scientific evidence. When healthcare providers face unexpected changes in a patient's condition or uncontrollable situations during care delivery, they may have less confidence or feel fearful / anxious about the care process and result. As people, healthcare providers may hold beliefs regarding the effect of external, supernatural forces on events, which may lead to superstitious beliefs and behaviors. Also, superstitious beliefs may be adopted by healthcare providers as a mechanism to cope with stress, anxiety, and uncertainty in situations where standard medical practices offer no ready solution. Although superstitious beliefs may help ease anxiety and feelings of failure in healthcare providers, this issue and the effects of these beliefs on medical staff behavior have not been adequately studied. The concept analysis strategy of Walker and Avant (2019) was applied in this study to define this concept and to examine (1) healthcare providers' loss of environment control and domination of irrationality in decision making, (2) the lack of objective evidence to explain cause-and-effect relationships in health-related situations, and (3) how unverified true or false claims become a compliance criterion among healthcare providers. Typical, borderline, and contrary cases were used to explain the concept of superstition in medical staff. The antecedents and possible consequences of healthcare providers holding superstitious beliefs were identified and the empirically addressed measurement tools were evaluated. This analysis may be used to improve the understanding of healthcare workers regarding superstitious beliefs. The results are expected to benefit clinical practice, facilitate further research, and enhance healthcare quality.