Have you ever found yourself praying in a hospital room, for yourself or a loved one? I have, and according to new research, we\u2019re doing the right thing. Studies have shown that patients with faith cope better with illness and often heal faster or are more accepting of the outcome than those without.<\/p>\n
Maybe that\u2019s why nearly 70% of hospitals today in\u00advest in spiritual health-care specialists known as chaplains.<\/p>\n
That high percentage surprised me. Surgeons, radiolo\u00adgists, oncologists: These are people trained in the scientific method, taught that every ailment has a physical cause that yet even they seem to agree that faith can make a difference in a patient’s recovery.<\/p>\n
How can faith\u2013something unseen, something immeasurable\u2013have a measurable effect? To answer this question, I sat down to interview the men and women involved with HealthCare Chaplaincy, or HCC, a New York City-based research and ministry organization.<\/p>\n
\u201cHealth care is holistic,\u201d began the Rev. Eric J. Hall, a minister of 23 years and the president of HCC. \u201cThat means that we have to take care of the body, mind and spirit.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is Chaplaincy 101: It\u2019s not just about a patient\u2019s relationship with God. It\u2019s about how the patient\u2019s faith interacts with his or her body and mind. A patient\u2019s illness or trauma may affect her faith in God. A chaplain\u2019s job is to help a patient\u2019s faith contribute positively to her prognosis.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we can re\u00adduce our patients\u2019 spiritual distress,\u201d said the Rev.George Handzo, director of health services at HCC, \u201cwe can help them to better use their spiritual or religious resources, and that\u2019s going to affect everything else.\u201d<\/p>\n
It can even pave the way for miracles.<\/p>\n
The Rev. Sue Wintz, director of education at HCC and a chaplain for 35 years, offered one example. A young gang member in Phoenix, 19 years old, had suffered a gunshot wound to his spinal cord, confining him to a wheelchair for life. His lack of faith had led him into a downward spiral that threatened his recovery.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis mother and girlfriend couldn\u2019t seem to reach him,\u201d Sue said. \u201cHe said he would rather die than face life as a quadriplegic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sue tried to help the young man articulate his despair. They prayed, and she encouraged him to confront difficult spiritual questions: What did this injury mean for his future? What did God have in store for him?<\/p>\n
The young man\u2019s talks with Sue produced an infusion of hope. Soon he was strong enough mentally, physically and, most important, spiritually to take control of his own recovery. He adapted to life in a wheelchair, got out of the hospital, went back to school and stayed away from gang life.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat, to me, was a miracle,\u201d Sue said. \u201cHe didn\u2019t get a physical healing, but he got a spiritual ones.”<\/p>\n
Chaplains use a nonjudgmental, nondenominational approach to spiritual health care. The Rev. Florine Thompson, director of pastoral care at St. Luke\u2019s-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York, told me about a woman in her thirties who was diagnosed with end-stage renal disease.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was told she had three to six months to live,\u201d Florine said. The woman was a mother of two children, aged 9 and 11. She was devastated.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe couldn\u2019t understand why God had allowed this to happen to her,\u201d Florine said. \u201cShe was a good mom, she took care of herself and she didn\u2019t drink or smoke. The ill\u00adness didn\u2019t make sense to her. She couldn\u2019t accept it.<\/p>\n
“A kidney trans\u00adplant was her only chance, yet she couldn\u2019t bring herself to put her name on the list. She had been raised with religious beliefs against organ trans\u00adplants, and that still weighed on her.\u201d<\/p>\n
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The patient\u2019s mother called on Florine for help. Her approach? Draw on the woman\u2019s inner resources to give her a new perspective.<\/p>\n
\u201cI asked what was most dear to her in this world, and she said her two children. So I said, \u2018If you could talk to your kids right now, and they could make a decision for you, what would they want?\u2019 She began to cry. They would want her to live.<\/p>\n
“She sensed that God had something very special for her to do and that she hadn\u2019t accomplished it yet. She wanted to be around to raise her two children.\u201d<\/p>\n
The woman agreed to meet with the organ-donation team and put her name on the list. Several weeks later, Florine ran into the patient\u2019s mother in the hospital. She said her daughter had received a new kidney and was expected to make a full recovery.<\/p>\n
Stories like these are why people in the medical profession don\u2019t dis\u00admiss the immeasurable aspects of faith, and perhaps why they are of\u00adten unsurprised to see miraculous healings. A patient open to belief is a patient open to hope, open to the improbable.<\/p>\n
When faith works hand in hand with a doctor\u2019s care, it is far more likely a patient will follow instructions, strive for recovery mile\u00adstones and accept the setbacks that might make others give up.<\/p>\n
Florine says all patients have \u201ca sacred story\u201d\u2013something so funda\u00admental to their soul that they won\u2019t share it with just anyone. Chaplains encounter these sacred stories ev\u00adery day.<\/p>\n
Part of their job is to help patients and their loved ones figure out how their sacred story can make sense of an illness, no matter what the outcome, and how the soul tran\u00adscends the body, how healing comes in many forms.<\/p>\n