A key containing the participant's name, and confidential code was developed.

Informed consents and questionnaires were coded with the participant's confidential code

and are kept in a locked file cabinet in the principal investigator's office.

Measures

 Demographic data. Age, gender and ethnicity were coded using a coding key

(see Appendix G). Demographic data was entered on an Excel spreadsheet after

enrollment. There was no missing demographic data.

Preoperative Questionnaire Measures

Indicator of spirituality

 The Spiritual Involvement and Belief Scale- (Revised (SIBS-R) Hatch, Burg,

Naberhaus, & Hellmich (1998) evaluates a broad range of intrinsic spiritual content from

ability to find meaning in life to spiritual writings. Designed for use with individuals of

all religious and non-religious traditions that include Christian, Judeo, Hindu, Islam and

Atheist. This instrument differs from other spiritual measurement tools in that it is not

limited to individuals with a Judeo-Christian tradition.

 For the purpose of this study one question was selected to evaluate participants'

spirituality. Two groups were created using the response to the question, "How spiritual

a person do you consider yourself?" Subjects were asked to rate themselves on a scale of

1 to 7 with 7 meaning "the most spiritual". Those groups who rated themselves 5, 6, or 7

were considered highly spiritual and coded as 1. Those who rated their spirituality as

1,2,3, or 4 were considered less spiritual and coded as 0

Indicator of self-health assessment

 The Rand SF-36 Health Status Questionnaire measures physical functioning, social

functioning, role functioning (physical problems) and role functioning (emotional