Review: Golding and Dixon, Spiritual Care for Non-Communicative Patients

Linda S. Golding and Walter Dixon, Spiritual Care for Non-Communicative Patients: A Guidebook (Jessica Kingsley, 2019).

Review by Rev. Petra Sprik, Chaplain, Carolinas Health

            For many chaplains and spiritual care providers, especially those newer to the profession, delivering care to non-communicative patients can be intimidating or difficult.  Many questions arise about how to connect to patients who cannot verbalize what they are thinking, whom to address in the room if there are other people present, and what to offer to a patient who cannot express their preferences.  And yet in spite of the challenges, research attests to spiritual care being beneficial to non-communicative patients.  

In their book, Spiritual Care for Non-Communicative Patients, chaplains Linda S. Golding and Walter Dixon address this important topic.  Over the course of seven interactive chapters, the authors guide the reader through delivering dignity-filled spiritual care to adult patients affected by brain injury, sedation or comatose states who are not able to communicate.  Each chapter addresses a unique aspect of a hospital-based chaplaincy visit, such as entering the room of a non-communicative patient or prayer with a non-communicative patient. 

The way that the guidebook is constructed allows the reader to engage in the topic at their own pace and with their own approach to spiritual care.  Rather than offering a one-size-fits-all recommendation of how to provide spiritual care to non-communicative patients, the guidebook allows the reader to thoughtfully engage their own opinions with research findings and wisdom accrued from other chaplains.  Each chapter provides brief instruction from the author, questions to help the reader reflect on their own opinions, and quotations from various chaplains about the subject. The book concludes with an in-depth description of a didactic to allow for further learning about spiritual care to non-communicative patients. 

Spiritual Care for the Non-Communicative Patient is an informative resource to any staff chaplain, student, or spiritual care provider looking to enhance their care of non-communicative patients.  As Dr. Harold G. Koenig attests, “read it, teach it, welcome it.”

You can view a webinar with Linda Golding on her work with non-communicative patients here (free).