LPT SPIRITUAL NEEDS ASSESSMENT TOOL

At a meeting with members of the Spiritual and Pastoral Care Team for Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT) this morning, I'm given a copy of their Spiritual Needs Assessment Tool, recently developed for use with patients in ward settings. It's a fairly simple and straightforward questionnaire, which I've copied out below.

Spiritual and Pastoral Care

Chaplains from the Spiritual and Pastoral Care Team are available to visit on wards to provide spiritual and pastoral care for those of any faith or none. You do not need to be religious to use our service.

If you would like support from the team please could you fill in the form and return to use. Thank you. [Then, after space for Name, Ward and Date]:

1. Do you follow any faith or religion?
2. If so, which one?
3. Do you wish to practise whilst in hospital? (If "No", go to Q4)
4. What do you need to do this?
5. Would you like pastoral or spiritual support from the team?
6. Is there anything that gives you a sense of meaning or purpose?
7. What are the sources of hope, strength, comfort and peace for you?
8. What keeps you going in difficult times?
9. What or who helps you most when you feel anxious or need help?
10. What are your fears about the future?
11. Have you had any major losses recently?

BRIEFING LPT'S SPIRITUAL & PASTORAL CARE TEAM

I'm at the Chaplaincy Centre, Daisy Peake Building at The Towers on Gipsy Lane this morning with Abida Hussain, Equality and Human Rights Officer, Integrated Equality Service, Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT).

We're briefing members of the Spiritual and Pastoral Care Team on the NHS Staff Multi-Faith Resource. Four of their six-member team are here this morning:

• Revd Sally Martin, Lead Chaplain;
• Revd Frances Ballantyne (no relation), Christian Chaplain who covers Ashby, Coalville, Hinckley and Loughborough community hospitals as well as one afternoon per week at the Bradgate Unit;
• Revd Rowenna Bass, Christian Chaplain who covers Lutterworth, Market Harborough, Melton Mowbray, Oakham community hospitals;
• Imam Fazlur Diwan, Muslim Chaplain who covers the Bradgate Unit, Arnold Lodge, and also works with Community Teams.

Sally was helpful in the development of the resource, which contains appropriate information about the services of the Spiritual and Pastoral Care Team.

Abida and I have done a number of briefings on the resource to ward staff at various hospitals over the past few months (see blog entries passim). These tend to be brief (though, hopefully not rushed), catching staff at the times of handover between shifts. This morning, it's good to be able to speak longer and to discuss the content and use of the resource in greater depth.

We also talk about the Prayer Room at Lakeside, LPT’s new company headquarters. I offer a copy of the dossier compiled by Rosemarie Fitton when we were working with Highcross on their Prayer Room, so that LPT can benefit from its collection of examples of good (and bad) practice, not only for this facility at Lakeside, but for Prayer Rooms operating at its other sites.

We discuss the proposed Staff Inter-Faith Forum, which is still in embryonic form. We talk about how use of social media (particularly podcasting) can play its part in making this project a success.