Leah Klug is a Seattle-based palliative care chaplain. She has spent her career as a spiritual care specialist helping to meet the spiritual needs of clinicians and patients within public sector healthcare systems.
In this episode, she shares how she and her palliative care team quickly equipped clinicians within their healthcare system with the palliative care skills required to navigate the challenges associated with caring for a massive influx of dying patients throughout the COVID pandemic.
She also shares how her team works to help healthcare providers to develop rituals to grieve their losses, maintain their human dignity, and reaffirm their identity as healers in challenging circumstances.
Leah also discusses how healthy team functioning benefits from a grounding in each team member’s spiritual tradition (whether mindfulness practice or rocking out to Meatloaf).
Finally, she shares her perspective on healthcare providers as “essential” humans whose clinicians and healthcare leaders must prioritize spiritual and emotional needs.
Additional Resources:
Spiritual Care
Transforming Chaplaincy - Desjardins & Redl (2022):
https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.transformchaplaincy.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/eBook-final-22.2.27.pdf&source=gmail&ust=1655077157656000&usg=AOvVaw1gh-8ee_tItCIua8psA0ws
Moral Injury
APA Guidelines for Managing Moral Injury (2020): https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.psychiatry.org/File%2520Library/Psychiatrists/APA-Guidance-COVID-19-Moral-Injury.pdf&source=gmail&ust=1655077157657000&usg=AOvVaw1nOACskv_yOGT51YmRPE-F
Moral Injury in times of COVID-19- Williams, Brundage, & Williams (2020): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7195905/
Leadership Strategy Session: https://forms.office.com/r/ZM6Q4h7q9k
If you’re doing the internal work to transform yourself as a leader to maximize your impact on your healthcare system – I want something more for you. That is precisely why I got into working with healthcare leaders and leadership teams in the first place.
Join me for a complimentary Leadership Strategy Session (https://forms.office.com/r/ZM6Q4h7q9k) where you’ll have a chance to consider your values and develop a strategy to realign your actions with your core values.
Contact me (dr.nicoladepaul@mendinghealthsystems.com) if you have questions or want additional details about this free Strategy Session. And keep in mind…because of the very special nature of this mindfulness-based work, just a few seats are available each month!