Spirituality is 'part of palliative care’
Michele V. Shaar, DNP '25, is a palliative care nurse practitioner at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, Illinois. Her DNP research examines the role of spirituality in her field, and she says it plays an important role in her job.
By Tim Bannon
Photo by Saad Bruce Shaar
How has spirituality guided your career?
Spirituality has always been important to me. I always felt a deep connection to God. It gives me peace and keeps me on solid ground.
How does your faith influence your nursing?
I am Muslim, and Islam is very much like Christianity with a strong emphasis on caring for the sick and supporting those in need. I’m very respectful of people of differing faiths. I try to be very inclusive and very open. I’m not there to preach my religion nor would I want to. I know how important their faith is to them.
What drew you to palliative care?
I started out working in a skilled nursing facility. Then after I became a nurse practitioner, I joined a private practice and we would see patients who were recently discharged from the hospital. These patients were still very sick, trying to do whatever they could to get better.
I found myself having lots of deep conversations with patients and families, and spirituality came up many times. I’m good at this and it fulfills me. I’m helping patients at the end of their lives.
When you see spiritual distress in your patients and families, how does that play out, and how are you able to ease that?
I spend a lot of time with my patients and so I see the spiritual distress. I ask if faith is something important to them. We also have tools that we can use to assess spiritual distress or spiritual needs.
I feel most fulfilled when I can really sit down with patients and families and talk about what was going on and discuss options of care. If things truly weren’t going to get better, there were other options. We could talk about comfort care or less aggressive measures.
How can nurses better serve patients and families who are dealing with advanced illness or end-of-life situations?
When I started my role in palliative care, I wasn’t comfortable discussing spirituality because I didn’t want to overstep anything. But it is part of nursing and it’s part of palliative care. Even though we’re very busy, it’s a part of our job to spend more time with these patients and their families and to have difficult conversations.
It is one of the most important things on patients’ minds. The fact that they are leaving this world and what that means for them. If we can just listen to patients, that’s important. I hope that in the future, nurses can be better prepared to help patients spiritually.
Michele V. Shaar, DNP '25, is a palliative care nurse practitioner at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, Illinois. Her DNP research examines the role of spirituality in her field, and she says it plays an important role in her job.
By Tim Bannon
Photo by Saad Bruce Shaar
How has spirituality guided your career?
Spirituality has always been important to me. I always felt a deep connection to God. It gives me peace and keeps me on solid ground.
How does your faith influence your nursing?
I am Muslim, and Islam is very much like Christianity with a strong emphasis on caring for the sick and supporting those in need. I’m very respectful of people of differing faiths. I try to be very inclusive and very open. I’m not there to preach my religion nor would I want to. I know how important their faith is to them.
What drew you to palliative care?
I started out working in a skilled nursing facility. Then after I became a nurse practitioner, I joined a private practice and we would see patients who were recently discharged from the hospital. These patients were still very sick, trying to do whatever they could to get better.
I found myself having lots of deep conversations with patients and families, and spirituality came up many times. I’m good at this and it fulfills me. I’m helping patients at the end of their lives.
When you see spiritual distress in your patients and families, how does that play out, and how are you able to ease that?
I spend a lot of time with my patients and so I see the spiritual distress. I ask if faith is something important to them. We also have tools that we can use to assess spiritual distress or spiritual needs.
I feel most fulfilled when I can really sit down with patients and families and talk about what was going on and discuss options of care. If things truly weren’t going to get better, there were other options. We could talk about comfort care or less aggressive measures.
How can nurses better serve patients and families who are dealing with advanced illness or end-of-life situations?
When I started my role in palliative care, I wasn’t comfortable discussing spirituality because I didn’t want to overstep anything. But it is part of nursing and it’s part of palliative care. Even though we’re very busy, it’s a part of our job to spend more time with these patients and their families and to have difficult conversations.
It is one of the most important things on patients’ minds. The fact that they are leaving this world and what that means for them. If we can just listen to patients, that’s important. I hope that in the future, nurses can be better prepared to help patients spiritually.