Spirituality, Religious Wisdom, and the Care of the Patient
Overview
Alan
B. Astrow, M.D.
aastrow@maimonidesmed.org
The experience of serious illness raises questions that can best be termed "spiritual" because they relate to our spirits, what it is that animates us, gives meaning to our every day lives and our relations with others, and motivates us in the face of adversity. Critical illness may force patients and physicians to confront, often for the first time, the fact of bodily limitation and their own mortality. The difficulty that physicians and other health care professionals may have in acknowledging the spiritual in our patients' lives may lead to frustration, mutual misunderstanding, and ill-conceived treatment plans.
Two years ago, the departments of medicine and medical ethics, the comprehensive cancer center, and the department of spiritual care at St. Vincent's Hospital in Manhattan sponsored an inter-faith conference series on spiritual issues in patient care: Spirituality, Religious Wisdom, and the Care of the Patient." The program opened with an all day conference in June 2001 and then was followed by a monthly series of inter-faith dialogues from November 2001 through June 2002.
The series had a two fold agenda. First, because a patient's religious background may influence how the patient respond to sickness, we sought to educate health care professionals about how different religious traditions view medicine and illness.
Second, we hoped to stimulate reflection and discussion by health care professionals of their own response to the demands of caring for the seriously ill, to provide a forum in which different members of the health care team could talk with each other about the tough emotional and spiritual issues that their patients would bring to them.
Thanks to a generous grant from the Alfred E. Smith Foundation, and with the support of the St. Vincent's Auxiliary, we have been able to organize a new conference series that will take place monthly from February through December 2004 with a break in July and August. In 2001-2002 we examined the uplifting dimension to spirituality and health care, with topics such as hope, faith, gratitude, healing, forgiveness, and love. This year in contrast we will focus on the inter-religious response to some of the more troubling emotions-such as anger, guilt, shame, sadness, or fear-patients and health care professionals may experience. We will maintain the format of inter-faith dialogue and case based discussion.
Published: September 17, 2004