Abstract
This Boston-based pilot research was an exploratory study that integrated outpatient chaplaincy into a refugee and immigrant health primary care clinic. Patients were screened for spiritual distress and offered a meeting with chaplaincy interns. Forty-eight patients were seen in clinic, 28 were screened, and 9 met with a chaplain. Most frequent domains of spiritual distress were grief (n = 8), feelings of abandonment (n = 5), guilt (n = 4), betrayal (n = 4), fear of death (n = 3), shame (n = 3), and trust (n = 3). Faith was relevant to treatment decision-making for 6 patients. It was found that outpatient chaplaincy services are a feasible intervention to address spiritual distress in immigrant and refugee patients.
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Dr. Kimball, Ms. Chergui, and Rev. Gould contributed to the study conception and design, and supervision of the project. Data collection and analysis was performed by Ms. Chergui and Ms. Syeda. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Dr. Kimball, Rev. Gould and Ms. Syeda and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Kimball, S.L., Syeda, H.S., Chergui, H. et al. Embedding Chaplaincy Services in Primary Care for Immigrants, Refugees and Asylum Seekers: A Boston Pilot Intervention. J Relig Health 62, 55–64 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-022-01568-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-022-01568-8