Two conferences, Creating More Compassionate Systems of Care (November 2012) and On Improving the Spiritual Dimension of Whole Person Care: The Transformational Role of Compassion, Love and Forgiveness in Health Care (January 2013), were convened with the goals of reaching consensus on approaches to the integration of spirituality into health care structures at all levels and development of str...

The development and the organization of chaplaincy in the European context are very diverse. The religious history and the culture of a country are the most determining factors. Still an increasing trend towards professionalism is noticeable. The number of professional associations for chaplains, for example, is growing. The need for professional chaplaincy is founded on the paradigm of whole p...

PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES To investigate spiritual transformation among patients with cancer. DESIGN Longitudinal. SETTING A university medical center in the midwestern United States. SAMPLE 47 adult cancer survivors. METHODS Patients were asked about spirituality, religious and spiritual importance, religious coping, and spiritual gain and decline at baseline as well as nine months post-treat...

UNLABELLED BACKGROUND Spiritual needs of cancer patients should be assessed and discussed by healthcare professionals. Neurosurgical nurses need to be able to assess and support neuro-oncology patients with their spiritual needs from diagnosis and throughout their hospital stay. METHODS Data were collected through questionnaires using a Critical Incident Technique (CIT) from neurosurgical ...

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES To explore Singapore hospice nurses' perspectives of spirituality and spiritual care. DESIGN A descriptive, cross-sectional design was used. BACKGROUND Spiritual care is integral to providing quality end-of-life care. However, patients often report that this aspect of care is lacking. Previous studies suggest that nurses' neglect of this aspect of care could be attribute...

CONTEXT Spirituality, religiosity, and spiritual pain may affect advanced cancer patients' symptom expression, coping strategies, and quality of life. OBJECTIVES To examine the prevalence and intensity of spirituality, religiosity, and spiritual pain, and how spiritual pain was associated with symptom expression, coping, and spiritual quality of life. METHODS We interviewed 100 advanced can...

One of the most crucial palliative care challenges is in determining how patients’ needs are defined and assessed. Although physical and psychological needs are commonly documented in patient’s charts, spiritual needs are less frequently reported. The aim of this review was to determine which explicit, longitudinal documentation of spiritual concerns would sufficiently affect clinical care to a...

As nurse researchers, we were studying Iranian nurses’ competencies in spiritual care recently. Using a selfdirected instrument, we surprisingly found that nurses have low acquaintance with the spirituality concept and how to provide spiritual care. Similar to other caring activities and procedures, spiritual care improves people’s spiritual well-being and performance as well as the quality of ...