94 Enhancing spiritual and emotional care for the dying person and those identified as important to them

<h3>Introduction</h3> The 5 Priorities for Care of the Dying Person asks all healthcare professionals to plan and deliver individual and co-ordinated plans of care which include spiritual support. Having a terminal illness often leads people to think about their lives in new ways so it is vital to assess and address spiritual and emotional needs to optimise comfort and minimise distress in the last days of life. However, spirituality is often exclusively conceptualised as religion and whilst the Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care Service (CSCS) is ideally placed to provide spiritual care to all who need it, referrals for input are typically only prompted when religious needs have been identified. Here, the Specialist Palliative Care Service (SPCS) propose increased education &amp; awareness of spirituality for all staff and proactive identification of dying patients by CSCS as interventions to enhance spiritual care for the dying person and those identified as important to them. <h3>Method</h3> Baseline data captured in The National Audit of Care at the End of Life (NACEL) highlighted a need to improve assessments and delivery of spiritual and emotional support. Local retrospective documentation audits were undertaken to gather comparative data once interventions were implemented. <h3>Results</h3> The results show an overall 15% improvement in documented discussions around spirituality and emotional needs in the 18 months following implementation when compared to the same period pre-implementation. <h3>Conclusions</h3> Increased delivery of education and awareness of spirituality by SPCS and proactive identification of dying patients by CSCS had a positive impact in evidencing documented discussions around spiritual and emotional care. Further opportunities to support spiritual care include: Continue to emphasise the importance of spirituality in PEoLC education. Simplify care plans to elicit clearer information on spiritual needs. Embrace trust-wide initiatives to enhance delivery of spiritual and emotional care. Ongoing audit to monitor sustainability of improvements.