Spiritually Competent Practice in Health Care

This book will be of tremendous use to all healthcare professionals from physicians to nurses to social workers, rehabilitation therapists, and chaplains. The pathway taken here is a sensible and reasonable one, emphasizing a patient-centred approach that underscores the importance of spiritually competent care. The Editors do an excellent job of describing how to integrate spirituality into patient care for all of the different healthcare professionals. They also emphasize the importance of an evidence-based approach that is guided by research. This book provides superb guidelines that will be enormously helpful to every healthcare professional.

Harold G Koenig, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina

This practical guide tackles the important issues of spirituality in health care, emphasising the role of organisations in developing a culture of leadership and management that facilitates spiritual care. Spirituality is a central part of holistic care that addresses physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects of care in an integrated way.

The chapters are written by experts in their fields, pitched at the practitioner level rather than addressing ‘spirituality’ as a purely theoretical concept. Each one describes the realities of spiritually competent practice and show how it can be taught and put into practice in a variety of areas and settings, including

Undergraduate and Postgraduate education

Acute healthcare settings

Mental health

Primary care

End of Life Care

Creative organisations

Social services

Ideal for practitioners, educators, trainees and managers in nursing and healthcare, the book is also relevant reading for occupational therapists, physiotherapists, social workers and psychologists.

John Wattis has many years’ experience of working as an academic consultant in psychiatry for older people and in medical management, and has co-authored many research and educational papers in these areas. Over the last 20 years or so he has developed a particular interest in issues around spirituality in healthcare. He is co-author or co-editor of a number of books concerning aspects of old age psychiatry and management and leadership in medicine. He is a founder member of the Spirituality Special Interest Group (SSIG) in the School of Human and Health Sciences at the University of Huddersfield, and is co-supervisor of a number of PhD students working in the field of Spirituality and Healthcare. A number of his recent publications, co-authored by members of the SSIG have been in the field of Spirituality and Healthcare.

Stephen Curran has many years’ experience as a consultant in old age psychiatry and has a particular interest in the biological and pharmacological aspects of psychiatry. He believes this needs to be accompanied by good, humane inter-personal care. He is an experienced teacher of old age psychiatry and supervisor of psychiatrists in training. He has published research, books, chapters and educational papers in the psychiatry of old age.

Melanie Rogers has worked as an Advanced Nurse Practitioner in Primary Care as well as running the MSc Advanced Nurse Practitioner course at the University of Huddersfield for many years. She is passionate about holistic care and working with patients to offer hope during times of illness and crisis. Her PhD focuses on Spirituality in Primary Care and she has spoken internationally and nationally about this. She is a founder member of the SSIG and British Association for the Study of Spirituality executive committee member. She was awarded the Queen’s Nurse title in 2008 for her commitment to patient care and education