HEALING HOSPITAL: A DARING PARADIGM

Healing Hospital: A Daring Paradigm

Healing Hospital: A Daring Paradigm

Introduction

The healing hospital principle has an integral role in healing of the mind, body and spirit. Healing hospitals must have a healing culture; reflect values, beliefs and philosophies of the people and the community they serve. (Engel 1977) Therefore, the physical building, caregivers and services provided must be all consistent with its regional and organizational culture. The distinctive approach in the healing hospitals is that health and wellness care binds together the science of evidenced-based medicine with the spirituality of healing.

Characteristics Of A Healing Hospital

The characteristics of a healing hospital consist of:

Respect for the healing guidelines connected with interpersonal caring.

Provide healing, educational, and supportive human experiences.

Recognize and promote self healing abilities of the human.

Place patients and the value of human interaction in the center of the healing journey for the benefit of the patient and caregivers.

Offer highest quality technical tools for healing.

Offer technical competency and kindness, competency, compassion, acceptance and spirituality. (Frager 1997)

Discussion

Spirituality is a way one finds hope, comfort, and inner peace in one's life. Some find spirituality through religion, music, art, nature values and or principles. It seems that the mind, body and spirit are connected and the health of any one of these elements can affect the other.

Continual Bereavement

Bereavement may manifest in response to many losses. The loss of a child, for example, could include miscarriage, ectopic pregnancy, neonatal loss, severe handicap, termination following prenatal diagnosis, death of a twin / triplet gestation, relinquishing a child for adoption and induced abortion, as well as the unexpected loss of the "perfect." When "bad news" is delivered to adult patients, whether it is a diagnosis of cancer, (Milstein 2003)Alzheimer's disease, diabetes mellitus, or any one of a myriad of far less serious conditions, they and their families may have feelings of despair and hopelessness.

When despair predominates, indicating pathologic grief and depression, even cognitively and emotionally mature individuals may be unable to participate in active grief and the outward expression of distress, and may thus have difficulty dealing with normal activities and with others. It is critical to offer care that is designed to provide emotional support as well as cognitive understanding because intellectual recognition alone does not suffice to resolve grief issues. It is necessary to provide care that includes affective, behavioral, cognitive, social, somatic, and spiritual components; moreover, this care should be provided on a continual basis because the sense of loss may occur not just at the outset, but also recur with potential relapses or staged changes associated with the course of a disease and illness. For example, children with developmental disabilities and their families may experience a feeling of bereavement each time the usual milestone is not attained. Similarly, adults with Alzheimer's disease, and particularly their families, may undergo significant feelings of loss as numerous competencies progressively disappear. (Engel 1977)

Healing with Curing

Addressing the patient's and family's cognitive, emotional and spiritual concerns as part of the healing arm of the paradigm ...