The importance of Spiritual Care in the Nursing Practice Essay

The importance of Spiritual Care in the Nursing Practice - Essay Example Through nurse education, students can develop spiritual self-awareness and be more apt to provide sensitive, spiritual care for other as they advance through development as a nurse (Shores, 2010). The purpose of this paper is to identify the importance of nurse education on spiritual care. Using critical inquiry, I will identify personal beliefs, assumptions and meaning on the subject while analyzing the importance of this care in practice. My spiritual development has been ongoing and will continue to be a component of my nurse education. I recognize that before I can begin to address the spiritual needs of patients’, I first need to address my own. I identify spirituality is an inner path enabling me as a person to discover my deepest values and beliefs; the ones in which I live by. Although I am not Christian, I continue to explore my spirituality and beliefs through Catholicism. I believe in one God made up of three persons and that Jesus Christ is his son. I believe the b ible is The Word of God written by men inspired by him. I believe in his virtues of honesty, truthfulness, respect, compassion, love, joy and more. I am a spiritual person inspired by his righteousness to be the best that I can be to do good as a person. In nurse education patient-care is much more than disease management; it involves the needs of the whole person; mind, body and soul. Addressing the patients’ spirituality should be a routine part of nursing care for many reasons. The first being that, religious beliefs and spiritual needs are common amongst patients, second, spiritual beliefs influence medical decisions, third, there is a relationship between spirituality and health, and the last, supporting a patients’ spirituality can enrich the nurse-patient relationship. Spiritual development is an ongoing, component of overall learning. Identifying student perspectives of these areas of spirituality can further their educational journey (Shores, 2010) Students ca n incorporate spirituality into their practice by assessing their personal values, beliefs. By doing so students are able to identify their own personal biases and assumptions and by incorporating a knowledge base of ethical practices outline by their institutions, legislation and professional practice guidelines. Ultimately, incorporating spiritual care in a patients practice can be identified by taking a patient’s history. Spiritual history gives insight to a patients’ value and belief systems and can be helpful identify spiritual distress. Spiritual history recognizes patients’ sources of hope, strength and comforts in the healing environment. Spirituality is generic Spirituality in nursing has two sides to it. One, spirituality observed by the nurse and the other, spiritual inclination of the patient. Therefore, a nurse has not only to be spiritual but also respectful of the religious beliefs of her patients. Only then, spirituality in nursing becomes wholes ome. It is strange that while religiousness is associated with well-being in health, nursing discourse involved in health care, has not attached much importance to spirituality that is concomitant with