Spirituality Assessment in nursing care assignment

Spirituality Assessment in nursing care assignment

This assignment introduces you to spiritual concepts. Identify an individual (friend or family member) willing to participate in a spiritual assessment. Use the two different tools, HOPE questions and the FICA tool (Attached) to interview the participant.

Share your findings in a 3 page paper *along with a reflection about which tool you found was the most helpful in guiding your nursing care*. Discuss what situations you would you choose to use each tool.

There exists a lack of agreement around the definition of spirituality, indeed debate continues within the academic literature around the conceptualisation and definition of both spirituality and religiosity (1). Spirituality has been described as an umbrella term to denote the various meanings and interpretations of the term (2). Within nursing definitions of spirituality have been seen to include elements such as a higher power, feelings of connectedness, purpose and meaning in life, relationships and transcendence (3-5).

Regardless of the way it is defined or conceptualised spirituality is reported to contribute to the health and wellbeing of individuals (6).

Spiritual wellbeing is associated with a number of positive outcomes including a greater tolerance of the emotional and physical demands of illness amongst patients (7) decreases in pain, stress and negative emotions (8), and lower risk of both depression and suicide (7). Patients who receive adequate spiritual care are also reportedly more satisfied with their hospital care and treatment (9).

The reverse appears true for unmet spiritual needs, with suggestion that when patients’ spiritual needs are unmet there are seen to be lower levels of satisfaction with care received (10). Unmet spiritual needs appear to have a profound impact upon patient wellbeing (11). These adverse outcomes include reduced levels of quality of life, increased risk of depression and reduction in perceptions of spiritual peace (12).

Subsequently spiritual needs are acknowledged as being an important part of nursing care and assessment, and as such it can be regarded as a patient outcome. Indeed internationally there is growing emphasis on the importance of the spiritual needs of patients (13). Spiritual care is believed to be a major part of the nurse’s role (14). This is consistent with the nurse’s role as a multifaceted one, focusing on holistic care, incorporating the physical, psychological, social and spiritual needs of patients (15). Research has acknowledged that spiritual distress may occur at any time during the patient’s journey and as such nurses should be prepared to provide spiritual care whenever it is needed including via the provision of a spiritual needs assessment (16). It has also been found (17) that nurses were both more likely to provide spiritual care and to contact specialist spiritual carers than physicians.

Despite this, there is evidence that spiritual needs and assessment are not always well engaged with by nursing staff, with suggestion in the literature that engagement with the spiritual needs of patients does not consistently occur (18). A variety of reasons may contribute to this, with the literature proposing various contributors including time pressures (19) and fear around the reaction of the patient to their attempts to aid with spiritual care (20). Cultural and religious differences may also affect ability to provide spiritual care, research (21) has found differences in knowledge of and training in spiritual care between Taiwanese and Mainland Chinese nurses. There is also said to be confusion amongst nurses about their role in spiritual care and assessment (22) a lack of clear definition over spiritual care as well as confusion over spiritual distress can act to make nurses less likely to deliver spiritual care to their patients (14). A perceived lack of skill in the area of spiritual care and of under preparation (23) and lack of confidence may also contribute (1). Indeed nurses often report the need for additional training provision in this area (e.g. 23).

Important information for writing discussion questions and participation

Welcome to class

Hello class and welcome to the class and I will be your instructor for this course. This is a -week course and requires a lot of time commitment, organization, and a high level of dedication. Please use the class syllabus to guide you through all the assignments required for the course. I have also attached the classroom policies to this announcement to know your expectations for this course. Please review this document carefully and ask me any questions if you do. You could email me at any time or send me a message via the “message” icon in halo if you need to contact me. I check my email regularly, so you should get a response within 24 hours. If you have not heard from me within 24 hours and need to contact me urgently, please send a follow up text to

I strongly encourage that you do not wait until the very last minute to complete your assignments. Your assignments in weeks 4 and 5 require early planning as you would need to present a teaching plan and interview a community health provider. I advise you look at the requirements for these assignments at the beginning of the course and plan accordingly. I have posted the YouTube link that explains all the class assignments in detail. It is required that you watch this 32-minute video as the assignments from week 3 through 5 require that you follow the instructions to the letter to succeed. Failure to complete these assignments according to instructions might lead to a zero. After watching the video, please schedule a one-on-one with me to discuss your topic for your project by the second week of class. Use this link to schedule a 15-minute session. Please, call me at the time of your appointment on my number. Please note that I will NOT call you.

Please, be advised I do NOT accept any assignments by email. If you are having technical issues with uploading an assignment, contact the technical department and inform me of the issue. If you have any issues that would prevent you from getting your assignments to me by the deadline, please inform me to request a possible extension. Note that working fulltime or overtime is no excuse for late assignments. There is a 5%-point deduction for every day your assignment is late. This only applies to approved extensions. Late assignments will not be accepted.

If you think you would be needing accommodations due to any reasons, please contact the appropriate department to request accommodations.

Plagiarism is highly prohibited. Please ensure you are citing your sources correctly using APA 7th edition. All assignments including discussion posts should be formatted in APA with the appropriate spacing, font, margin, and indents. Any papers not well formatted would be returned back to you, hence, I advise you review APA formatting style. I have attached a sample paper in APA format and will also post sample discussion responses in subsequent announcements.

Your initial discussion post should be a minimum of 200 words and response posts should be a minimum of 150 words. Be advised that I grade based on quality and not necessarily the number of words you post. A minimum of TWO references should be used for your initial post. For your response post, you do not need references as personal experiences would count as response posts. If you however cite anything from the literature for your response post, it is required that you cite your reference. You should include a minimum of THREE references for papers in this course. Please note that references should be no more than 5 years old except recommended as a resource for the class. Furthermore, for each discussion board question, you need ONE initial substantive response and TWO substantive responses to either your classmates or your instructor for a total of THREE responses. There are TWO discussion questions each week, hence, you need a total minimum of SIX discussion posts for each week. I usually post a discussion question each week. You could also respond to these as it would count towards your required SIX discussion posts for the week.

I understand this is a lot of information to cover in 5 weeks, however, the Bible says in Philippians 4:13 that we can do all things through Christ that strengthens us. Even in times like this, we are encouraged by God’s word that we have that ability in us to succeed with His strength. I pray that each and every one of you receives strength for this course and life generally as we navigate through this pandemic that is shaking our world today. Relax and enjoy the course!

Hi Class,

Please read through the following information on writing a Discussion question response and participation posts.

Contact me if you have any questions.

Important information on Writing a Discussion Question

• Your response needs to be a minimum of 150 words (not including your list of references)
• There needs to be at least TWO references with ONE being a peer reviewed professional journal article.
• Include in-text citations in your response
• Do not include quotes—instead summarize and paraphrase the information
• Follow APA-7th edition
• Points will be deducted if the above is not followed

Participation –replies to your classmates or instructor

• A minimum of 6 responses per week, on at least 3 days of the week.
• Each response needs at least ONE reference with citations—best if it is a peer reviewed journal article
• Each response needs to be at least 75 words in length (does not include your list of references)
• Responses need to be substantive by bringing information to the discussion or further enhance the discussion. Responses of “I agree” or “great post” does not count for the word count.
• Follow APA 7th edition
• Points will be deducted if the above is not followed

• Remember to use and follow APA-7th edition for all weekly assignments, discussion questions, and participation points.
• Here are some helpful links
• The is a great resource