Treating Through Prayer and Care: Parish Nursing Today
This 8-page undergraduate paper examines parish nursing, beginning with a brief overview of the history of parish nursing, and then moving to an examination of the parish nursing field today. This paper considers how the parish nurse functions in the community in her role both within the church, the hospital, and the greater community. Further, this paper examines the ways in which the philosophy of parish nursing coincides with current health care needs and with current trends in medical research. For example, this paper notes that changes in the health care mean that the system is increasingly strained and impersonal, making the attentions of the parish nurse important. Crucially, the parish nurses belief in treating the whole person - in mind, body, and spirit - reflects current research findings, which suggest the strong link between belief, emotions, and health. This paper, then, suggests that the main functions of a parish nurse revolve around multi-faceted roles involving prevention, personalized engagement, and dissemination of education and resource of referrals, rather than the primary care provided by both nurses.