A Brief Report: The Role of Spiritual Care in Cardiac Arrests

Background: Communication during cardiac arrest codes is inherently challenging. We designed a quality improvement project wherein chaplains responded to medical/surgical unit cardiac arrest codes. Methods: Chaplains were added to the cardiac arrest alert paging system and responded to these pages. Code alerts and chaplain responses to them were tracked. After four months, chaplains completed a survey to assess their experiences. Results: Chaplains attended a total of 42 codes. Chaplains responded to 19 of 24 daytime working-hour codes and followed up on overnight ones, for a total of 42 code responses. They supported patients, family members or visitors, patient roommates, and medical staff. The overwhelming majority (92%) found providing spiritual care during a cardiac arrest code to be meaningful. Discussion: Chaplains' presence during and after cardiac arrest codes was feasible and perceived as a useful intervention. Adding chaplains to the cardiac arrest code pager allows them to provide support to patients, their families, and staff members during these critical moments.