Verified Document

Place For Religion In Hospitals Research Paper

Healing Hospitals The United States is teeming with many people that are religious and/or spiritual in nature. In addition to that, many hospitals are owned and/or operated by religion-oriented groups with Jewish and Catholic hospitals being two of the more prevalent examples. These two facts in conjunction are very inter-related because many people associate healing with religion and many hospitals are beginning to actively embrace that in their operations and procedures. To be sure, not all people are religious and religious wishes and preferences, whatever they are, should be honored by a hospital caregiver irrespective of whether the beliefs of the hospital are different from the patient. However, for those where faith and healing working together are a mutual goal of the patient and the medical staff, scholarly research shows it can be embraced, if for no other reason that it keeps everyone positive and upbeat despite medical challenges. While there are obvious limitations to when and how religious practices should interweave with medical care, they should not be shied away from if there is any emotional or spiritual benefit to employing them while administering care.

Analysis

The components of a healing hospital are actually not all that complicated. As advanced by Ashcraft, Anthony and Mancuso (2010), hospitals are starting to embrace the dual-front care strategy of healing and spirituality as a way to keep spirits high and help the patient. Indeed, they state that if having a spiritual environment for a patient helps them in any way, they are all for instilling and including that into the care provided. Indeed, the Joint Commission Standards and Elements of Performance note that one's spiritual outlook absolutely affects and guides a person's views towards their care strategy and overall outlook. Rather than ignoring that or resisting it, it is seen by many as a natural progression to embrace that fact and craft a counseling and advice strategy on that being the case. Rather than allowing healthcare...

An obvious reason for this is that a person that faces medical struggles with optimism and faith will almost always do better overall than someone that does not and hospitals and other medical professionals should integrate into the care rather than ignore it. A key part of making that work is distinctly and specifically asking the patient what their medical preferences are. If they do not, they could foist religious views on someone that believes something else entirely. For example, while Jews and similar to Catholics in some respects and Baptists have some similarities to Muslims, there are also major differences and stepping on the proverbial toes of people in that way is exceedingly unwise (Ashcraft, Anthony & Mancuso, 2010).
To prevent hurt feelings and religion-related problems, it is best to just pause and sit down with the patient and find out what their feelings are, their fears are and how the medical staff can best soothe them. Sure, there are some general tactics that can assist just about anyone. However, everyone is different in one way or another and this is even true of dealing with people of the same religion or sect. Whatever can be done to assure people that religion will be used only to help, but not certainly not hurt, a patients feelings (let alone their health) should be the natural order of things in a healing hospital. The most important thing at that point is the person's care and absolutely nothing should supersede that as doing so is a violation of both medical ethics as well as the ethics of a Christian (as well as that of most other people, most religious and non-religious). One very important question to ask is to fetter out how a patient personally views their religion and spirituality. Some people strongly link them…

Sources used in this document:
References

Ashcraft, L., Anthony, W., & Mancuso, L. (2010, June 30). Is spirituality essential for recovery?. Is spirituality essential for recovery?. Retrieved April 26, 2014, from http://www.behavioral.net/article/spirituality-essential-recovery

Dunn, L. (2010). Creating healing environments: A challenge for nursing. Online Journal

of Rural Nursing & Health Care, 10(2), 3-4.

Eberst, L. (2008, April 1). Log in. Innovation at Work. Retrieved April 26, 2014, from http://www.chausa.org/publications/health-progress/article/march-april-
Mendocino Coast District Hospital. Retrieved April 26, 2014, from http://www.mcdh.org/wellness/healing-hospital-program/
Cite this Document:
Copy Bibliography Citation

Related Documents

Religion in Indonesia Islam in
Words: 2136 Length: 7 Document Type: Essay

A key celebration in the village invites a festive dance in which the performers fall into a stupor and try to stab themselves with knives (Heinrich, 2005 p. 78). Rituals in life are pertinent events for religious display and artistic expression. Events of puberty, marriage life and burial offer opportunities for Balinese to express their notions regarding statuses, society and the afterlife. The Balinese denomination organizes their faith in a

Religion and Secularism in Turkey
Words: 3751 Length: 11 Document Type: Term Paper

" The Constitution allows rites of worship and religious services and ceremonies. It protects people from being compelled to worship and participate in these religious rites against their will. It forbids the exploitative use of religion, religious feelings or things held sacred for personal or political influence. It insures that one can change his religion or belief by himself or as a group, privately or publicly. The Constitution has these

Religion and Abortion When a Hospital's Moral
Words: 1392 Length: 4 Document Type: Book Report

Religion and Abortion When a hospital's moral and ethical decision making process comes into conflict with the source that provides funds for the hospital -- or goes against the grain of the values of the funding source -- the results can expected to be controversial at best and harmful to humans at the worst. Indeed, to be specific, when the Roman Catholic Church provides funds for a hospital, the Church expects

Hospital Case Study if the First Requirement
Words: 2934 Length: 10 Document Type: Term Paper

Hospital Case Study If the first requirement of any successful case study is a detailed and analytical examination of the situation, the emotional component of so called "high stakes" issues can make this requirement difficult, indeed. The simple fact, however, is in order to find good solutions and policies regarding the problem presented in the case study, one must apply the three main questions of "situation," "remedy/s," and "method/s." Although this

Religion, Spiritual Activism, Feminism, Reproductive Justice
Words: 1294 Length: 4 Document Type: A-Level Coursework

Religion, Spiritual Activism, Feminism, Reproductive Justice The concept of reproductive privilege is central to the proper interpretation of Amy Everhart's poem "Accidents." In fact, one may successfully argue that Everhart's poem is actually about reproductive privilege and her dearth of such a privilege because she is homosexual. The concept of reproductive privilege refers to the fact that some people -- based on their sexual proclivities -- are able to reproduce within

Discrimination Based on Religion Within
Words: 2985 Length: 10 Document Type: Research Proposal

Although Lundman was evidently the first case to award damages for faith healing, prosecutions of parents whose children die under similar circumstances are reasonably common.(64) Many of the cases involve Christian Scientists who do not accept the superiority of contemporary medicine to their faith-based care; and many others involve Jehovah's Witnesses, who do not accept blood transfusions because of the biblical prohibition on ingesting blood.(65) but official punishment is

Sign Up for Unlimited Study Help

Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.

Get Started Now