Defining and Applying Spirituality Within End-of-Life Care
Research type
Research Study
Full title
How can we understand, define and apply spirituality for patients at the End-of-Life: A Mixed Method Study from a Critical Realist Standpoint.
IRAS ID
329972
Contact name
Cara Bailey
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Birmingham
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 11 months, 0 days
Research summary
The study aims to investigate the understanding of ‘Spirituality’ amongst people at the end-of life, healthcare professionals and spiritual workers. The study will:
- Utilise a completed literature review on spirituality within End-of-Life Care - Researchers highlight the importance of ‘Spirituality’ within end-of-life care, and it’s positive effects towards a ‘Good Death’. However, in practice healthcare staff often struggle to understand and use spirituality within patient care, due to highly complex definitions of the concept leading to an inability to apply it in a practical manner.
- Analyse data from a healthcare professional survey about understanding and application of spirituality in caring for people at the end-of-life.
- Conduct semi-structured interviews with spiritual workers.
- Conduct semi-structured interviews with people expected to be in the last year of life.
- Co-Produce a working definition of spirituality within a spiritual workers focus group.
We aim to produce a definition of spirituality that is appropriate at the end-of-life and captures how the concept may change as death nears. What is important to a 'healthy' individual can change as death approaches, and assistance to meet spirituality requirements is essential to assist a ‘good death’. To increase understanding in this area, questioning of two main groups of people are required; (1) spiritual workers will be included to provide a diverse and inclusive representation of multi-faiths and different backgrounds; (2) People at the end-of-life (expected to die in the next 12 months) to determine how they define spirituality and its application in end-of-life care.
In a Zoom or Teams co-production event with spiritual workers, findings will be used to agree a working definition of spirituality and explore ideas of how it can be applied in practice to asses patients needs at the end-of-life.
REC name
West Midlands - Coventry & Warwickshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
25/WM/0002
Date of REC Opinion
10 Mar 2025
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion