Spiritual Needs Assessment PDF

Preview

Summary

Download Spiritual Needs Assessment PDF

Description

Spiritual Needs Assessment April Stewart GCU: HLT-302 Dr. Randy Weisberg September 13, 2020

2 Spiritual Needs Assessment

There are many challenges in health care when it comes to faith and spirituality with patients and health care providers. The importance of spirituality awareness is where health care workers need to be sensitive to each patients needs when caring for them. Although health care workers can easily over look a patients spiritual needs during certain situations, it is still very important to remember each patient is different in what it is they require. Spiritual assessments are a requirement by the Joint Commission to assess a patients needs and requirements for care. An interview was conducted with a 35 year old Hispanic Christian female who suffers from high blood pressure and diabetes after her most recent pregnancy. She was diagnosed with gestational diabetes as well as pregnancy induced hypertension when she was about 30 weeks pregnant. Towards the end of her pregnancy she ended up in the hospital with fetal monitoring, where the end result was an emergency c-section. During the procedure, she started bleeding a lot and required emergent blood transfusions. Transcript of interview: The interviewee and I were able to meet in person —What is your age/sex? 35 year old female —What is your religion? Christian —What is your ethnicity? Hispanic —Do you or have you had any health concerns? Yes, high blood pressure and diabetes due to my most recent pregnancy. Which has lead to more hospital stays and amplified my need for spiritual healing. —How has those health concerns impacted your spiritual needs? It has geared me to include more prayer, and depend on my faith for complete healing.

3 Spiritual Needs Assessment

—Can you share what your expectations were from health care workers to tend to your spiritual needs while also following a medical care plan? I believe just having compassion and respect for ones faith is what brought me comfort. —You said you required blood transfusions, is this something that is against your religion? No, blood transfusions are not against my religion, and an assessment was completed upon my admission to the hospital to assess that criteria. —Do you feel most healthcare workers were respectful of your spiritual needs? Yes, in fact the respiratory therapist who helped care for me actually sat down with me, held my hand, and prayed with me when she saw I was scared. —If you knew your caregiver was Christian, would that make you feel more at ease in your healing process? Absolutely, having been in a scare health care situation and knowing someone is willing to hold my hand and pray with me and for me put me at ease. Analysis of interview: Upon admission to the hospital a spiritual assessment was completed, and one question that was asked was “do you give consent for blood transfusions if necessary?” Her answer to this was yes, she consented to it. One reason this question is asked, is because there are religions that do not allow the transfusion of blood regardless of the state of the emergency at hand. However, this patients religion does not frown down upon it. During this scary time for her she prayed a lot, the health care workers around her prayed with her. One person she remembers that prayed with her a lot was the respiratory therapist that was helping care for her. She held her hand and they prayed for health for her as well as for her baby. All of the health care workers that cared for her were very respectful of her spiritual needs.

4 Spiritual Needs Assessment

This interviewee believes that having compassion and respect for ones faith brought her much comfort during her hospital stay. This is very important to her because as a health care provider herself she knows that having someone who is willing to hold her hand and pray with her put her at ease so she was able to relax and heal. The interviewee still battles health issues related to this most recent pregnancy such as high blood pressure and diabetes. She is very holistic with her self care, and makes sure that she takes time for herself. She meditates, and uses essential oils to create a very calm environment. When she feels herself become stressed at all she knows that creating a calm environment will help her to relax and helps her body to heal. As a health care provider, I will use this spiritual assessment to understand the needs of my patients that might have the same experiences as she did. I will ask permission before I assume anything as far as praying with the patients. As a lot of patients, even though they are very spiritual and faith based, they might not want to pray with others. They might find comfort in just praying quietly to themselves, and relying on their relationship with God to help them heal and relax....