Keeping the Spirit Alive
Most of us would like to think that we will end our lives at home -surrounded by people, objects and memories familiar and important to us. But many of us may spend our last years, weeks or days in some kind of health or care setting.
Faith in Older People has just completed an action research project, Delivering Spiritual Care – in which we conducted interviews with staff in three residential homes across the country to find out how staff understand the spiritual needs of older people.
What is “spiritual care”?
Our research found that spiritual care is being provided but it is not understood in those terms. Staff and residents do have an understanding of the importance of this thing called “spirituality” but struggle to articulate quite what it is. Carers tended to assume that spirituality meant religious observance. This meant they did not recognise that they were already delivering spiritual care in their daily activities with the residents.
Being recognised first as a person with a full life history and having it acknowledged by word and deed is of crucial importance to the way in which an older person will experience their time in residential care.
Allowing residents time to talk and reflect on what really matters to them, in the past or the present, is part of this.
The staff interviewed recognised that there were activities which were part of the daily routine which enhanced the spiritual lives of the residents, baking, being given choice over food, being supported in doing as much as they could for themselves, and celebrating special events together.
One of the points the care staff made again and again is how important fresh air is to the residents - it lifts their spirits.
Training
The results of interviews and observations were discussed by the project team and used to draw up recommendations for training programmes with the staff in care homes. The message was loud and clear: keep it short and keep it regular in order to fit in with their busy shifts
Some topics they thought could be covered included:
- creative activities as a way to talk about or reflect on spiritual issues.
- the possible emotional upheaval surrounding transition into care for the individual, the family and the consequences for the care home staff.
- the spiritual issues surrounding death for both staff and residents.
They identified some of the issues they thought should be covered including how to convert “normal” caring practice into spiritual care.
Our report “Delivering Spiritual Care” has been presented to the Scottish Government, Older People and Age Team, who had funded the project.
The project was conducted by
Faith in Older People with
Dr Harriet Mowat
of Mowat Research.
Download Delivering Spiritual Care
