To provide good quality family-centred care nurses need adequate resources, appropriate education, support for managers and support from other healthcare disciplines.

Family-centered care (FCC) is a philosophy of care that recognizes the family's central role in the child's life and in the delivery of care. We used a survey design to investigate the practices and perceptions of nurses toward FCC in Ireland. Data were obtained from 250 nurses in seven hospitals using the Family-Centered Care Questionnaire-Revised (FCCQ-R). Findings indicated that nurses' practices were significantly different from their perceptions of FCC. Nurses with dual registration (children and adult) had significantly lower mean scores on the total current (practice) scale than the other registration subgroups. Nurses with a baccalaureate or a higher academic qualification had higher mean scores than nurses who held a certificate-level qualification on the total necessary (perception) scale, which assessed the activities perceived to be necessary for FCC. Findings showed that nurses support FCC but perceive the design of the health care system and parent-professional collaboration as barriers to FCC practice.

Healthcare chaplains operate in many healthcare sites internationally and yet their contribution is not always clearly understood by medical and healthcare staff. This review aims to explore the chaplains' role in healthcare, with a view to informing best practice in future healthcare chaplaincy. Overall the extent of the provision and staffing of chaplaincy service internationally is unclear. From this review, several key spiritual and pastoral roles in healthcare emerge including a potential contribution to ethical decision making at the end of life. Healthcare chaplains are key personnel, already employed in many healthcare organizations, who are in a pivotal position to contribute to future developments of faith-based care, faith-sensitive pastoral, and spiritual care provision. They also have a new and evolving role in ethical support of patient, families and healthcare teams.

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CitationAn exploration of the extent of inclusion of spirituality and spiritual care concepts in core nursing textbooks.