Spiritual interventions provided by mental health nurses

This descriptive qualitative study explored the spiritual nursing interventions provided by mental health nurses. Fifty mental health nurses responded to open-ended interrogative statements to report on nursing interventions in three situations that supported the spiritual needs of patients and families. Their responses were grouped into four categories, nurses being with the client, doing for the client, encouraging the client to look inward, and encouraging the client to look outward. Being with was demonstrated through the presence of the nurse. Doing for included interventions performed on the client's behalf and included the nurses using time, people, and space to provide care. Clients were encouraged to look inward for strength and look outward for people and objects that could be resources for them. A serendipitous findings was that mental health nurses were able to describe the ideal spiritual interventions but reported fewer instances of actually having intervened.