Special Issue “International Conference of Spirituality in Healthcare. Nurturing the Spirit”—Trinity College Dublin 2016

religions Editorial Special Issue “International Conference of Spirituality in Healthcare. Nurturing the Spirit”—Trinity College Dublin 2016 Fiona Timmins 1, *,† , Richard Egan 2 , Bernadette Flanagan 3,† , Yvonne Muldowney 1,† , Colm OBoyle 1,† , Vivienne Brady 1,† ID , Jacqueline Whelan 1,† , Kathleen Neenan 1,† and Wilfred McSherry 4,5,6,† ID 1 2 3 4 5 6 * † School of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin, 24 D’Olier Street, Dublin 2, Ireland; (Y.M.); (C.O.); (V.B.); (J.W.); (K.N.) Department of Preventive and Social Medicine (DSM), Dunedin School of Medicine, University of Otago, Dunedin 9054, New Zealand; Waterford Institute of Technology, Waterford, Ireland; Department of Nursing, School of Health and Social Care, Staffordshire University, Blackheath Lane, Stafford ST18 0AD, UK; The University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS NHS Trust, Newcastle Rd, Stoke-on-Trent ST4 6QG, UK VID vitenskapelige høgskole, Haraldsplass Bergen, Ulriksdal 10, 5009 Bergen, Norway Correspondance: ; Tel.: +353-1-896-3699 These authors contributed equally to this work. Received: 12 September 2017; Accepted: 13 September 2017; Published: 26 September 2017 This is an editorial of a Special Issue regarding the International Conference of Spirituality in Healthcare held in the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin, Republic of Ireland (ROI), on June 2016 (Spirituality Research and Innovation Group 2016). This event was the second international spirituality in healthcare conference hosted by Trinity College Dublin, with a third international conference planned for 22 June 2018. Conferences such as this provide a unique opportunity for academics and clinicians in healthcare to share their research findings, clinical practice and emerging ideas. The conference is international and multidisciplinary and as such provides a novel space and platform for discussion and debate on the topic. The editorial draws together a selection of published papers, arising from the conference; collectively these demonstrate a continuing and growing interest in the subject of spiritualty in healthcare. 1. Embracing Spirituality across International Healthcare Contexts This Special Issue, related to the conference, features a range of international papers with a particular focus on spirituality and spiritual care concerns within healthcare. It is clear that the topic of spirituality is gathering attention in a variety of diverse fields across healthcare internationally. It is obvious from these discussions that the concept of spirituality is not new within healthcare (Keenan 2017; Romeiro et al. 2017). Rather it has long been considered best practice to ensure that responses within healthcare, across all phases of life, are holistic and address the human physical, psychological, social and spiritual aspects (Keenan 2017; Romeiro et al. 2017; Egan et al. 2011). However, what is novel is that spirituality is now receiving unprecedented attention within international healthcare research, evidenced for example by Egan et al. (Egan et al. 2011) first national study of nurses views on spirituality within healthcare in New Zealand. Furthermore, while spirituality is traditionally associated with end of life care (Romeiro et al. 2017; Velosa et al. 2017) these papers reflect the widening and diverse application of spirituality in areas such as intellectual disability, day surgery, infertility and dietetics (Romeiro et al. 2017; Keenan and MacDermott 2016; Pike 2017; Patel et al. 2017). Religions 2017, 8, 204; doi:10.3390/rel8100204 www.mdpi.com/journal/religions Religions 2017, 8, 204 2 of 7 In keeping with contemporary understandings of spirituality, these papers generally refer to spirituality as a sense of connecting with others, transcendence and finding meaning and purpose in life (Velosa et al. 2017; Weathers et al. 2015; La Cour and Hvidt 2010). Transcendence in this sense refers to the concept of a higher or greater purpose in life; a sense of what it is important to do and what constitutes a good or a right way to live. By providing spiritual care, healthcare workers can support an individual’s quest for meaning making during particular life events, such as undergoing day surgery or to aid people to improve their self-worth, find support from their faith perhaps assisting them to eat better and lose weight (Patel et al. 2017). Although it is pointed out that while the aforementioned underpinning definitions inform many of the discussions and research published in this issue we are also reminded that little overall consensus on definitions of spirituality exists (Egan et al. 2011; Velosa et al. 2017). There are also inconsistencies, lack of direction and lack of education in relation to healthcare staffs’ role in providing such spiritual care (Romeiro et al. 2017; Egan et al. 2011). Current evidence suggests that while health carers may be aware that patients have spiritual needs, they are lacking in confidence and at times, feel ill-equipped to deal with these concerns (Keenan 2017; Egan et al. 2011). (Keenan 2017) adds to the debate by suggesting that carers may sometimes confuse religion and spirituality and in addition, some may question the relevance of spiritual care. Keenan suggests that nurses need to develop competence in spirituality in health care by deepening their knowledge of various belief systems and supports and knowing when to incorporate a multidisciplinary team approach (Keenan 2017). Evidence to address spiritual health care needs can be developed by knowing and appreciating a patient’s personal spiritual understanding, beliefs and practices. A lack of health care practitioners’ confidence in this field is displayed in comments such as: “People are too scared to show any religious or spiritual leaning. It is frowned upon. Religion is also unpopular, not in vogue. You are thought of as weird. You have to be very careful to express or show spirituality, which is a sad reflection on society” (Egan et al. 2011, p. 13). This comment also highlights the interesting perspective on ethical issues related to spiritual care that also arises within this issue. The need to address spiritual care is advocated in several national and international healthcare policies (Romeiro et al. 2017; Egan et al. 2011), thus not providing this care, or providing substandard care is an ethical issue. Furthermore, there needs to be caution when attempting to address spiritual needs in healthcare, as (Keenan 2017) points out as some people may not wish to confront this issue, perhaps due to a lack of confidence. The pastoral care workers that provided spiritual-based dietary advice for young people in Patel et al. study highlighted these ethical concerns (Patel et al. 2017). These trainers felt out of their depth dealing with some of the existential and emotional issues that could arise as a request of addressing this particular topic (Patel et al. 2017). Keenan (2017) thus call (...truncated)