The COVID Surge: What Have We Learned?

While individual chaplains and spiritual care departments around the country learned lessons from their first experiences with COVID in the spring of 2021, the surge experienced by the nation late into the year and into the new year presents new challenges.

This panel of spiritual care providers in some of the hardest-hit areas will discuss how this latest wave differs from the early days of the pandemic and what they have learned in their experience. Together we will explore questions such as:

• How did the second wave qualitatively differ from the first?
• How were chaplains better prepared for the surge, and what new challenges appeared?
• In light of the vaccine now being deployed, what is the outlook for spiritual care vis-a-vis COVID in 2021?

**Please note: this session will be recorded and all registrants will receive a copy of the video as soon as it is available.**

We will be joined by:

• Tahara Akmal, CPE Manager, MedStar Washington Hospital
• Rev. Peggy Kelley, Lead Christian Chaplain, Cedars-Sinai Hospital
• Robert Kidd, Director of Spiritual Care, Houston Methodist Hospital
• Carrie Kohler, Chaplain, Cedars-Sinai Hospital