How Korean Psychiatric Staff Deal with Religious and Spiritual Issues of Patients: What Is Professional?

In contrast to other secularized countries, religious and spiritual needs and/or aspects of patient-centred-care are hardly studied in South Korea, even less in the context of psychiatry and psychotherapies. This study investigates religious and spiritual values of Korean psychiatric staff, and their experiences as well as considerations regarding their patients’ religious and spiritual aspects in clinical settings. In 2015, we surveyed psychiatric staff in Daegu and suburban areas using Korean versions of the Duke Religion Index and a questionnaire on Religion and Spirituality in Medicine: Physicians’ Perspectives by F. Curlin. Six clinics participated in our research. A total of 328 questionnaires were distributed. Ultimately, 270 fully completed questionnaires were analysed (return rate: 82.3%). Regarding religious and spiritual values, Korean psychiatric staff does not differ considerably from the average of the Korean population. However, there are significant moderate correlations between their own religious and spiritual attitudes, and their consideration as well as behaviors related to religious and spiritual aspects of their patients. In addition, there is evidence of an unconscious bias which influences treatment. These results call for more professional attention and self-reflective training.

The meaning of life in medicine: non-religious spiritual care in Japan

Within the context of a growing global interest in the role of spirituality in medicine, “spiritual care” has developed as a form of patient-centered care that addresses existential suffering. This paper provides an introduction to spiritual care in Japan. On the basis of publications by leading Japanese authors on spiritual care, it first shows how spiritual care developed in Japan and how it is understood as a way of providing meaning and comfort distinct from “religious care.” Then it introduces some common methods used for spiritual care in Japan. Overall, it argues that the way spiritual care is conceptualized and offered in Japan provides suggestions for how spiritual care might be offered to patients who are non-religious and do not see themselves as “spiritual”.