Care of the Spirit: Effects of an Interdisciplinary Undergraduate End-of-Life Course on Knowledge, Competence, and Response Empathy

The purpose of this pilot was to identify the effects of a 4-credit interdisciplinary undergraduate course focused on communication strategies to enhance spiritual care at the end of life. The course provided students with opportunities to enhance their ability to communicate empathically with individuals facing the end of life. Evidence-based content focused on ways to live each day with hope and gratitude, strengthen relationships, create a legacy, and find meaning and purpose in life and death. Narayanasamy's (1999) Actioning Spirituality and Spiritual Care Education and Training in Nursing model guided project development. The study used a prospective, pretest/posttest design. Participants included undergraduate students (n = 34) from nursing, premedicine, athletic training, business, economics, and religious studies at a Midwest liberal arts college. Statistically significant differences were found in students' attitudes toward and knowledge of spirituality/spiritual care (P
Source: Journal of Hospice and Palliative Nursing - Category: Nursing Tags: Feature Articles Source Type: research