Hospital staff struggle to accommodate patients’ religious beliefs

HOSPITALS are crying out for help in caring for patients whose religious or cultural beliefs rule out certain medical procedures and practices.

A report found medical and support staff, such as chaplains and caterers, were often at sea when faced with patients with strict beliefs that did not fit into the general ethos of the hospital or healthcare setting concerned.

Examples included the recent cases where hospitals went to court to secure the right to carry out blood transfusions on patients from the Jehovah’s Witness faith who believe God forbids them to receive blood.

Report author, Dr Katy Radford, a Belfast-based social anthropologist commissioned to carry out the research on behalf of the Irish School of Ecumenics, Trinity College Dublin,

.also cited the example of baby Callis Osaghae who died in Waterford in 2003 after a botched circumcision carried out by an untrained member of the Nigerian community because the service was not available in the public healthcare system.

Other problems she encountered involved women of strict Muslim faiths being distressed by having to wear revealing hospital gowns and undergo examination by male doctors, and Hindu and Sikh patients remonstrating with medics trying to make them remove their turbans.

A catering manager revealed it cost at least three times more to provide a Kosher meal. Rituals around death also presented problems as several faiths required burial within 24 hours which did not allow sufficient time for post mortem examinations, while some bereaved families expected to be allowed attend to the body of their loved ones contrary to hygiene and infection control policies.

Chaplains were also mainly Christian and struggled to provide support to other faiths, and there was often a scarcity of translation services for non-English speakers.

Dr Radford said: “There is a tendency for healthcare providers and practitioners to assume a one-size-fits all approach which does not reflect the diversity, varieties and cultural sensitivities within individual faith communities.

“Staff are frustrated and their professionalism compromised by a lack of codes of conduct in relation to balancing legal/medical requirements with cultural expectations in, for example, postmortems, blood transfusions, provision of specific medication and death and funerary practices.”

Linda Hogan, a professor at the school, said she hoped the findings would prompt the formation of a national policy.

She said it was important, not just for patients of differing faiths, but for the multinational workforce running the country’s health services.

“Ireland’s learning curve towards becoming a genuinely multicultural society is proving short and steep. Understandably, the policy priorities so far have been largely reactive,” she said.