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Ageing and spirituality

Ageing and spirituality. Age Concern Rodney 20 th August 2009 Manaakitanga -Respecting our elders Chris Perkins: Selwyn Centre for Ageing and Spirituality. Summary. What is spirituality? How is it expressed? Spirituality in Aotearoa/ NZ Spiritual neglect and abuse The way forward.

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Ageing and spirituality

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  1. Ageing and spirituality Age Concern Rodney 20th August 2009 Manaakitanga-Respecting our elders Chris Perkins: Selwyn Centre for Ageing and Spirituality

  2. Summary • What is spirituality? • How is it expressed? • Spirituality in Aotearoa/ NZ • Spiritual neglect and abuse • The way forward

  3. spirituality • The personal quest for understanding answers to ultimate questions about life, about meaning and about relationship to the sacred or transcendent …. (Koenig etal 2001)

  4. spirituality • “ that which is essential to our humanity, embraces the desire for meaning and purpose, and has personal, social and transcendent dimensions.” (Allen & Coleman 2006 pp. 205-206)

  5. spirituality • “That which lies at the core of each person’s being , an essential dimension which brings meaning to life… understood … broadly as relationship with God , however, God or ultimate meaning is perceived by the person and in relationship with other people” (MacKinlay 2001)

  6. Aspects of spiritual experience • Transcendence of the personal self • Intense awareness of the present • Feeling of connection with all of life, universe, supreme being…

  7. Outcomes of positive spirituality • “ … joy, forgiveness, awareness and acceptance of hardship and mortality, a heightened sense of physical and emotional wellbeing and the ability to transcend beyond the infirmities of existence… (Tanyi 2001) • Spirituality is closely related to hope

  8. Ways of mediating spirituality (E. MacKinlay 2001)

  9. Aotearoa / NZ: our roots Science British heritage Self-sufficiency / colonial Maori culture Egalitarianism Individual rights Enlightenment World wars Christianity

  10. Aotearoa / NZ: where we are today? active / doing fast-paced educated future -facing high expectations secular sceptical / questioning technological materialistic youth-orientated Society today litigious Individualistic reduced concern for society? risk-averse suspicious of institutions noisy

  11. What our institutions value… Health care : science Government: $$$ Church: youth

  12. Government Sat, 2 May 2009 Elderly care wrong place to make cuts Reducing community and long-term care services to older adults in Otago, as proposed by the Otago District Health Board (ODT, 21.4.09) may save money short term but will be a bad investment. Elderly at growing risk of malnutrition as costs rise Last updated 09:23 04/06/2008 A hidden epidemic of malnourishment is plaguing the elderly, with rising living costs set to make the problem worse, Grey Power says. Higher living costs and the Government's desire to keep the elderly in their own homes would exacerbate the problem, while pride and an unwillingness to be a burden meant elderly people would be unlikely to seek help, he said. Nats’ ACC cuts hit elderly, poor and farmers Thursday, 5 March 2009, 12:55 pmPress Release: Progressive Party 5 March 2009 Media Statement

  13. Health: evidence-based medicine

  14. Of all of the 13 factors for improved mental health, religious belief proved beneficial in more than 80% of studies, despite very few of these studies having been initially designed to examine the effect of religious involvement on health. (Sims A 2004 p. 294) In 1200 outcome studies and 400 reviews

  15. Caregivers: professional and unpaid Baby boomers and younger Relatively powerless Different SES Immigrants: new culture Poorly educated in A&S Different religions busy More / or less secular?

  16. Older people

  17. Religious affiliation of older people (NZ Census 2006)

  18. Neglect: ignoring personal and spiritual needs

  19. Some examples • No chaplain available in residential care • Can’t get person dressed or transported to chapel on time • Won’t allow person to walk outside RH • Separation from family (e.g. spouses need different levels of care) • Family don’t record religion on admission sheet • Meals are unsuitable • Ignoring religious rituals / celebrations • MHS don’t ask about spirituality • No time allowed to be with person • Older people in church seen as less relevant

  20. Abuse: imposing own ideas about spirituality / religion

  21. Some examples • Cut off the Church roll when no longer attending • Saying unwanted prayers to the person / proselytising • Only vegetarian meals served in 7th-Day Adventist home • Playing Radio Rhema to National Station listener • Repeatedly offering tea or coffee to Mormons… • Not allowing Muslim patient to pray (“get off the floor”) “…a woman who came to view her husband after death only to find a crucifix on the bedside and a chaplain waiting to offer solace. She and her husband had been atheists all their lives.” Costello, J. (2009)

  22. What saved us from becoming totally secular… Maori spirituality Taha Wairua: vital to health

  23. Government policies • Policy documents: wellbeing and holistic care , need for person-centred care • Ageing in Place can  isolation and family burden

  24. Where to from here? • Consciousness -raising • Education • Research • Advocacy • Times are changing…

  25. “ Western culture is undergoing a significant paradigm shift – from a materialist view, based on the assumptions of dualism, rationalism, positivism and empiricism, towards a naturalistic understanding that acknowledges the significance of such things as personal stories, emotions and experiences that cannot be explained purely in terms of science.” Culliford 2002

  26. “ If we do not assess for spiritual needs, we will not even begin to notice these needs, nor find ways of addressing them. As I see it, spiritual needs underlie the psychosocial needs of people---they lie at the very core of what it is to be human. If we neglect these, especially for people at critical points of their lives and for those who are facing their frailty, dying and death, then we neglect something equally important as failing to provide food… Spiritual care can no longer be seen as an optional care component.”E. MacKinlay 2006 p.69

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