Australian Patient Preferences for Discussing Spiritual Issues in the Hospital Setting: An Exploratory Mixed Methods Study

Abstract

While there is high patient acceptance for clinical staff discussing issues regarding spirituality with hospital inpatients, it is not clear which staff member patients prefer for these discussions. This unique exploratory study investigated inpatient preferences regarding which staff member should raise the topic of spirituality. A cross-sectional survey was conducted with inpatients at six hospitals in Sydney, Australia (n = 897), with a subset invited to participate in qualitative interviews (n = 41). Pastoral care staff (32.9%) were the preferred staff members with whom to discuss spiritual issues, followed by doctors (22.4%). Qualitative findings indicated that individual characteristics of the staff member are more important than their role.

‘Not me!’ a qualitative, vignette-based study of nurses’ and physicians’ reactions to spiritual distress on neuro-oncological units

“…Our ndings highlight the need for spiritual care to be treated as an interdisciplinary team effort [15,18]. We found that, by building strong interpersonal relationships with their patients and seeing them as an individual, healthcare professionals can alleviate spiritual distress and improve patient care, as seen in other studies [35,38]. However, most authors refer to spiritual care as a nursing practice and most data is based on nurses' experiences [29,30,39,40].…”

“…Similar to the recommendations of the EAPC [4], we could also identify self-re ection of the neurooncological staff to be of central importance to spiritual care, because establishing a genuine relationship with the patient may also represent an intimate experience with one's own self to which one must be open. A recent study suggests that staff's individual characteristics and openness to patients are more important than their profession when discussing spiritual issues [35]. As this can be a strain on the healthcare workers [7,10], setting personal boundaries becomes necessary.…”

Military Perspectives on the Provision of Spiritual Care in the Australian Defence Force: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…It is also known that, despite identifying as ‘non-religious’, this subset of the population is known to have a dynamic relationship with religion which may be more prominent in times of duress (Davie, 2015; Van Tongeren et al, 2021 ). Increased interest in chaplaincy support at times of struggle has been demonstrated in the healthcare setting (Best et al, 2023 ). This should be further explored in the military context.…”

“…It is reasonable to expect that not all personnel will require support from a chaplain, hence the need for a range of support options in the workplace which is currently the ADF practice. While some personnel reported not wanting to talk to a religious person, it is well known that confusion between religion and spirituality and a lack of understanding about the broad role of chaplains, may act as a barrier to accessing spiritual care in Western communities when it is associated with previous negative experiences with religion (Best et al, 2023 ; Layson et al, 2022 ). These findings suggest that increased education regarding the holistic biopsychosocial-spiritual nature of pastoral care would be of benefit to military personnel.…”

Spiritual Care in Palliative Care

“…This 'spiritual screening' (Best et al 2020) can be conducted regularly as part of initial intake and subsequent routine check-ups. Short screening tools have been validated in palliative care populations by Steinhauser et al (2006) and King et al (2017), although conversational prompts can also be effective within an established relationship (Best et al 2023).…”