Components of Healing Hospitals
The premise of healing hospitals is on the creation of an optimal healing environment for the patient. A healing environment encompasses the conditions of care giving and the nature of care provided to the patient. Essentially, the healing hospital paradigm entails the provision of medicine, intervention procedures and methods of engaging patients during the treatment period. This aspect is premised on the belief that spiritual and emotional wellbeing are critical contributors to the overall physical health of the patient (Chapman, 2010). Consequently, there is a unity of function and purpose when the mind, spirit and body are in sync. Therefore, the wellness of these aspects of the patient is critical for the realization of the healing objective through concern for the patient, compassion and unconditional love.
In light of this, healing hospitals aspire to provide not only medical treatment but also mental and physical health. Therefore, the patients comfort is a pre-requisite for psychological preparation of the prescribed treatment protocols. Furthermore, care givers must demonstrate their ability to treat diseases and provide compassionate care to the patient (Chapman, 2010). This ensures that the patient’s emotional, physical and spiritual problems are addressed promptly and sufficiently.
The optimal physical environment is critical for the success of the treatment procedure. Therefore, a healing hospital must ensure that its physical environment is tailored for an optimal healing process. For instance, it is critical that patients have a physical environment that provides a restful atmosphere to ensure that the body rejuvenates without disturbances such as noise from gadgets, attendants or visitors (Smith, Firth, Ananth, & Reece, 2009). A spacious Physical environment is essential to enable patients to experience the hospital’s ambience without the feeling claustrophobic due to tightly enclosed hospital spaces. Therefore, a healing hospital should ensure that a tranquil atmosphere prevails for successful recovery of the patient. A significant number of hospitals do not take into consideration factors influencing the patient’s emotional or spiritual state. In most instances, hospitals only seek to provide medica care. However, a healing hospital paradigm requires an environment that meets the patients needs such as entertainment and decent food.
A critical component of healing hospitals is technology and an integral work design. These enable the provision of qualitative and enhanced care services. The adoption of technology has led to enhanced satisfaction of services offered, improvements in privacy and security, reduction of costs and efficiency in service delivery. These factors are critical in creating an optimal atmosphere for healing, which is essential to the psychological requirements for an effective healing environment (Chapman, 2010). Therefore, most healing hospitals incorporate their hospital structures, technologies and design with such components as crucial contributors to the healing process.
Challenges Facing Healing Hospitals
While the healing hospital concept is premised on noble intentions, various challenges face the implementation of this concept significantly in environments characterized by traditional structures. A significant challenge to the establishment of healing hospitals is the financial aspect. Traditional hospitals are in most cases financially constrained; therefore, these hospitals have limited resources which are constrained to the immediate medical needs of the hospital. The creation of a functional healing hospital requires a significant amount of funds to be allocated to cost centers such as spacious facilities, staff recruitment and training among others (Chapman, 2010). Significantly, substantive funds are required for investments in technology and facilities, which are essential for the integration of the healing process with the hospital’s physical environment. Additionally, the premise of healing hospitals to attend to the patient’s emotional, spiritual and physical health requires significant investments in altering the perception and traditional culture of medical practice. This aspect is evident when trying to convince hospital administrators to embrace the healing hospital paradigm.
Among the challenges facing the implementation of healing hospitals are legal considerations. The traditional hospital setting faces a significant number of legal challenges such as the escalation of insurance premium costs and cases of litigation against hospitals. Given that the healing hospital paradigm is yet to be fully understood and accepted, it is more likely to attract higher insurance costs and litigation. Meanwhile, the ordinary hierarchical organizational structure of hospitals is restructured creating a system where each has equal responsibilities in patient care. This creates an administrative dilemma since there should be clarity on authority and division of responsibilities (Chapman, 2010).
Furthermore, the traditional hospital environment is premised on the application of proven scientific protocols; however, the healing hospital paradigm aspires to move beyond these, by including emotional and spiritual care into the healing processes. This aspect of healing hospital is often attributed to subjective beliefs, which cannot be quantified scientifically. Therefore, the method of applying relevant standards and adoption of values proves to be a challenge since patients come from diverse and dynamic backgrounds.
Biblical Passage asserting the Concept of a Healing Hospital
Healing hospitals are critically defined by religious doctrines; therefore, their existence is attributable to the interpretation of religious teachings. For instance, in an extract of the bible, the book of James 5: 14-15, Jesus Christ ask those who are sick to call on the elders so that they may be prayed for and be anointed with oil. He asserts that this will be an act of faith; therefore, an individual’s faith and prayer will be a contributing factor in healing. This reinforces the healing hospital paradigm through the identification of faith, prayer and healing as positive correlating factors in the healing process. Therefore, since prayer is the most fundamental aspect of religion, healing hospitals use prayer as the most applicable means of giving hope to patients.
In spite of the healing hospital concept being relatively new, its popularity is gaining momentum. The patient oriented approach employed by healing hospitals is critical in enhancing the wellbeing of patients and their family members and is not limited to medical attention. Therefore, focus on compassionate care and radical love significantly draws on coping strategies employed and hope, in most cases through religion and spirituality.
