Spirituality and hospice social work / Ann Callahan.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Many hospice social workers must address spiritual issues with their clients, but do not feel competent to do so effectively. This targeted volume draws upon multidisciplinary theory and research to advance a relational model of spiritually sensitive hospice care. The book will help readers elevate their spiritual competence and foster a relationship with their clients that will enrich the experience for all involved.

Spirituality and Hospice Social Work helps practitioners understand various forms of spiritual assessment for use with their clients. The book teaches practitioners to recognize a client's spiritual needs and resources, as well as signs of spiritual suffering. It also discusses religious and spiritual practices that clients may use to enhance their spiritual coping. Spirituality and Hospice Social Work stresses the need for interdisciplinary collaboration with other members of the hospice team, along with the value of maintaining professional ethical standards when addressing spiritual issues. Throughout, the importance of spiritual sensitivity and its effect upon client well-being is emphasized.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

Callahan (Univ. of Tennessee, Knoxville), a licensed clinical social worker, presents a comprehensive primer on spirituality primarily for palliative care and hospice social workers; it also is a valuable resource for all health professionals. Her account thoroughly outlines an issue that perhaps is not well recognized and is a potential source of conflict within the interdisciplinary health care team. Although the value of the interdisciplinary approach in providing end-of-life care is espoused in the literature, when it comes to spiritual care, there are undercurrents about role responsibility. Obviously, it is a chaplaincy role, but not all health care settings have adequate access or enough chaplains to address this important care component. Who then is best able to address the spiritual care of patients? With their background in psychosocial care, social workers, who more frequently are members of palliative care teams than chaplains, can and should fulfill this role. Among the four components of care--physiological, psychological, social, and spiritual--meeting the spiritual care of people, particularly as they face the end of life, is frequently inadequate. Callahan discusses how social workers bring a high level of competence for addressing spiritual suffering and need to be so recognized by the rest of the care team. Summing Up: Recommended. All readers. --Linda K. Strodtman, University of Michigan