The delivery of spiritual and religious care has received a high profile in national reports, guidelines and standards since the start of the millennium, yet there is, to date, no recognized definition of spirituality or spiritual care nor a validated assessment tool. This article suggests an alternative to the search for a definition and assessment tool, and seeks to set spiritual care in a practical context by offering a model for spiritual assessment and care based on the individual competence of all healthcare professionals to deliver spiritual and religious care.
Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics
This paper reports the results of a telephone survey of 693 respondents which was commissioned by the New Jersey Chiropractic Society. This exploratory study provides a broad-ranging and critical examination of key aspects relating to the chiropractic profession as it is practiced in New Jersey. The study concludes that chiropractic in New Jersey is a viable means of treating various disorders, but there remains much confusion and distrust among prospective and current patients as well as the threat of heightened competition from other health professionals.
The search for a synthesis bridging the gap between materialist and idealist approaches in anthropological theory has been invigorated by recent efforts to develop a critical medical anthropology. Not limited to integrating class analysis and cultural interpretation, the "mindful body" paradigm also aims at empowering the ill, whose experience is denied by biomedical and psychiatric categories that locate disease either in the body or in the mind, and treat them separately from one another and independently of social context.
Chaplains who are clinically trained and certified spiritual care professionals can make a unique contribution in today's increasingly pluralistic and global health care context with diverse religious, spiritual and cultural values, beliefs and practices. The author characterizes this contribution as spiritual/cultural competency. A self-defined web of meaning is unique to each person, comprised of a composite of values and beliefs, a fabric woven by way of one's life narrative.
Although traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is widely used in Chinese cancer centres, it is a brand new area for formal scientific evaluation. As the first step of developing a research programme on clinical evaluation of TCM for cancer patients, we conducted a qualitative study to explore the perspectives and experiences of Chinese cancer patients and TCM professionals. Twenty-eight persons participated in two cancer patient focus groups and one professional focus group. Semi-structured interviews were audiotaped, transcribed and translated.
