Spirituality in Nursing Practice

This book delivers a wealth of practical tools for incorporating spirituality into nursing. There are numerous articles on the concepts of spirituality and religion in nursing practice, including the nursing role in spiritual assessment, spiritual nursing diagnoses, spiritual care in various nursing contexts, and many more. Spirituality is a focus for debate and discussion within the nursing profession, and it is appropriate to consider this concept as it has captured the nursing world. The book discusses an interrelationship between resilience and holistic health. It also discusses challenges to incorporating spirituality into nursing practice. Although there is ample rationale for the inclusion of spirituality into nursing practice, education, and research, there are also challenges to such inclusion. Some would identify these challenges as “barriers”, but the word “challenges” seems to have more potential for positive action with respect to exploring each challenge and ways to overcome it. In order to appropriately incorporate spiritual assessment and care into practice, nurses need the requisite professional competency. Competencies are integral to nursing practice and usually accompany standards of practice. Standards for educating nurses about spiritual care are present in both educational and practice contexts in that they are part of the accreditation criteria for institutions. The book also focuses on spiritual assessment and spiritual care within the context of mental health care/mental health nursing and spirituality in palliative and hospice care.