Chaplain's Corner

There is optimism that the profile of Spiritual Care is being raised in the Health Care System of our Province.  The optimism is real and well founded and is the result of steady, persistent and reasoned lobbying for such by the Manitoba Interfaith Council.  Fruits of the Manitoba Interfaith Council’s work are beginning to be seen as demonstrated around the table each time the Provincial Spiritual Health Management Network meets. 

On the first Friday in June I sat in a board room around a table on the third floor of the Manitoba Health building at 300 Carlton Street in Winnipeg.  I had a place at the table as South Eastman Health’s representative to the Provincial Spiritual Health Management Network.  This Network is made up of representatives from the eleven Regional Health Authorities, Cancer Care Manitoba and Selkirk Mental Health Center.  It is led by Karen Toole who serves as the Spiritual Health Coordinator at Manitoba Health.  In the Manitoba Health organization of things, Mental Health, Addictions Services and Spiritual Care are grouped together.

This Network is a new group.  It has only been in existence about a year and it is just finding its feet in terms of understanding and figuring out how to address the spiritual health needs of the people who find themselves into the Province’s many health care facilities and programs.  As you might imagine, it is a pretty diverse group.  All would come from what would sociologically be called Christian denominations, but the similarities end pretty much right there.  But the point of the Network isn’t theological solidarity; the point is that these folks all have a concern for the spiritual needs of people served in the health care system of our province.  This is good for it gives human spirituality a place at the health care table in Manitoba.

Manitoba’s Ministry of Heath is unique among the Provinces and Territories of Canada in funding these kinds of positions.  Manitoba Health has come to acknowledge that the needs of the human spirit are integral to wellness, integral to health and with this acknowledgment comes this commitment to begin making provisions for the coordination of spiritual care services in the facilities of our health system. Our politicians should be congratulated for this commitment!

Eventually the Network will be made up of a group of Regional Spiritual Care Coordinators that serve in each of the eleven RHAs, at Cancer Care Manitoba and at Selkirk Mental Health Center. These positions will be funded by Manitoba Health.  Presently, North Eastman RHA, Interlake RHA, Norman RHA; and Cancer Care Manitoba have received funding for their positions; the others are to be funded, two or so a year until all the positions have been funded.  Sooner or later, South Eastman Health’s turn will come and our RHA will receive dedicated funding for a Regional Spiritual Care Coordinator.  Preliminary work has already been done in preparation for this: a job description has been drafted and requests for the position have been included in South Eastman Health’s Health Plan submitted annually to Manitoba Health.

Compared to most of the Regional Health Authorities outside Winnipeg, our region is rich in spiritual care resources in our health care facilities.  In the various facilities of South Eastman Health we have the equivalent of three full time professionally trained chaplains.

Bethesda Hospital and Place has a full time chaplain, myself.  I hold a Master of Arts degree in Pastoral Theology, have taken two basic and two advanced units of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) through the University of Winnipeg faculty of Theology and am a Certified Specialist in Institutional Spiritual Care with the Canadian Association of Pastoral Practice and Education (CAPPE).

Resthaven PCH has a full time chaplain, Bill Kehler.  Bill has been working on and is nearly completed the chaplaincy diploma course offered through Booth College in Winnipeg, a Salvation Army school.

The facilities of Vita and St. Pierre have a 0.4 EFT chaplain, Joy Andrusiak.  Joy got her training as an officer in the Salvation Army and has some Clinical Pastoral Education as well.  Joy worked for a time as a full time chaplain at the Health Sciences Center after leaving the Salvation Army and before moving to the Vita area.  The Menno Home for the Aged is presently in the process of hiring a chaplain to work three days a week. (0.6 EFT).  Ste Anne Hospital has no professional Spiritual Care services, nor does Villa Youville PCH or the PCH in St. Adolphe.

These positions are funding co-operatives between South Eastman Health and the churches of our region.  This too is unique. The only other rural region with professional chaplains is Central RHA and to my understanding its three positions are privately funded through faith-based foundations.  Besides the city regions, Winnipeg and Brandon, none of the other regions have any facility based chaplain providing bedside spiritual care to people that come into their health care facilities.

This isn’t to say that there are no spiritual care services being provided.  In many regions there are dedicated volunteers providing spiritual care services.  These volunteers come both from among local clergy persons and for other spiritually minded folks who have a concern in their hearts for the spiritual needs of those in hospital and residing in personal care homes.  This of course happens in South Eastman Health facilities as well.  However as is the case all over the province not much is being done in regards to the recruitment, orientation and supervision of spiritual care volunteers. 

One of the issues being investigated by the Provincial Spiritual Health Management Network is that of developing a Province wide spiritual care volunteer training course.  There have been preliminary discussions about this already and at the last meeting most of the representatives from the various regions voiced support for the development of such a training program.

Another issue that the Network is working on is that of developing a document that identifies the core competencies needed to be a spiritual care provider.  Identifying the core competencies is very important.  Every other discipline has identified these, whether it is for nurses, physiotherapist, or lab technicians.  Unlike the training of these other disciplines, there is not just one recognized training stream that a person needs to engage to prepare for providing spiritual care in a hospital or nursing home.  The many backgrounds out of which spiritual care providers come, results in some being better prepared for work in health care than others.  By identifying the core competencies needed to provide spiritual care in a health care setting, the Network will take the first step towards identifying and recommending the standardization of those competencies for those who want to work in spiritual care in a health care setting.

In my experience, I have seen good things grow out of small things.  Although I have worked in the field of spiritual care in health care for only eight years; in those eight years I have seen small stirrings beginning to grow and I continue to see them.  One of the good things that postmodernism has done for spirituality is that it has given it standing in many places where it had formally been dismissed and this is good.  Now, those of us who work in spiritual care, especially in non-religious settings, need to be vigilant and responsible, respectful and full of integrity as we seize these opportunities and take our places around these tables bringing an ever growing awareness to many that a person is far more than a biological entity, but a living spirit, and an eternal soul.