Aging, Spirituality and Palliative Care

Gain greater depth of understanding of end-of-life spiritual issues for older adults

The period of time when a person approaches death is always difficult both for the patient and the caregiver. Aging, Spirituality, and Palliative Care discusses best practices in aged and palliative care while addressing patients’ diverse spiritual needs. Leading authorities’ presentations from the Third International Conference on Ageing and Spirituality in Adelaide, Australia, in 2004 explore practical, sensitive spiritual approaches to help older patients deal with aging, illness, and approaching death.

Aging, Spirituality, and Palliative Care carefully examines what can be the most spiritually meaningful time in the life of an aging personconfronting illness and death. Though they may be unafraid of dying, older people many times fear the pain and suffering that may accompany it. The process of dying is presented with care and reverence, while providing effective approaches to increase comfort, spirituality, and quality of life. Each chapter is extensively referenced, and many include tables and figures that enhance understanding of research data.

Topics in Aging, Spirituality, and Palliative Care include:

helping older people to ’sustain the self’ to allow them freedom to do personal spiritual work

helping patients cope with changing circumstances

providing a sense of direction

the opposition of spiritual values by contemporary social policy

caring for each person as an ’ensouled body’ and ’embodied soul’

assessing spiritual needs

a positive approach to dementia

spiritual reminiscence as exploration of life meanings

study comparison of traditional religiousness versus de-institutionalized spiritual seeking

the pain associated with dyingand spirituality’s place in it

addressing the multiple aspects of suffering

clowning as care of the spirit

Buddhist and Christian approaches to understanding aging, death, and spirituality

caregivers adapting to the world of the patient

the spiritual aspect of palliative care in residential aged care

personal competence and operational competence in student learning

intimate, professional, and communal fidelity

Aging, Spirituality, and Palliative Care is meaningful, valuable reading for chaplains, pastoral workers, palliative care providers, social care providers, nurses, diversional therapists, and other workers who care for the aged.