Palliativpflege und Medizin

Abstrakt

Can We Judge a Book by its Cover? Hospital Admission Religious Identifiers and Personal Spirituality

David Glenister and Anne Collopy

This paper compares the religious identifiers patients choose on admission with their spirituality during the course of their care. Informed by George Fitchett’s recent Making Our Case(s) case study project, this project utilizes transcripts of case notes by pastoral practitioners to demonstrate how spiritual assessment can clarify the congruence or incongruence between these labels and individual spirituality. These case vignettes illustrate ways in which careful spiritual assessment can ascertain the importance and helpfulness - or not -of the religious tradition, and discern individual (and often unique) spiritual practice within or without that label. The aim is to highlight the necessity of ongoing assessment over the course of treatment, so that patients receive the spiritual care they need, and aren’t merely ‘judged by their cover.’ The objective is to inform strategies for future provision of spiritual care.