Spiritual Assessment in Palliative and End-of-Life Care

According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Association for Hospice and Palliative Care (IAHPC), being attentive to the spiritual dimension of the needs of patients in palliative care is important. In this chapter, we will discuss what is meant by the spiritual dimension of needs in palliative care and how this can be supported. We will discuss different levels of taking care (attentiveness, accompaniment, and crisis intervention) and describe how taking care of spirituality at the end of life has a moral and spiritual dimension because it is embedded in caring practices and attitudes. As an example of how care for the spiritual dimension of patients’ needs can be organized, we discuss the Utrecht Symptom Diary 4-D, a PROM in which the spiritual dimension of needs is integrated among other dimensions.