Uploaded August 2024 | Updated September 2026, 4 days ago
Over the last eight months, I have specialized in spiritual and emotional care for heart patients in the hospital. There is a clear link between spirituality, heart disease, quality of life, and life satisfaction. Caring for your heart is caring for your spirituality. From my experience in the hospital, patients often have very intense emotional and spiritual concerns that are often far more dire than even their heart condition.
As I have spent time with patients and families in the Cardiovascular units, I became curious, specializing in care for these patients over the last eight months. The physical distress of a major heart condition or disease are what brings these patients to these units, but my job as a Chaplain is to attend to the spiritual and emotional needs of these patients. I have been tracking many shared Common Stressors, which I would describe as "A Hardening of the Heart"
This video offers some of those insights, and I would invite your conversation about the links between spirituality, emotionality, and heart health.
Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:41 Grounding in Research
04:16 Specializing in Care for Heart Patients
05:26 Connection between Heart Health and Emotions
07:18 Softening the Heart
08:42 Holistic Care
09:15 Parallel Process for Me
References
DeSteno, David. Emotional Success: The Power of Gratitude, Compassion, and Pride. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2018.
Moeini M, Ghasemi TM, Yousefi H, Abedi H. The effect of spiritual care on spiritual health of patients with cardiac ischemia. Iran J Nurs Midwifery Res. 2012 Mar;17(3):195-9. PMID: 23833611; PMCID: PMC3696210. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3696210
Roth, Sam. “Spirituality Can Improve Quality of Life for Heart Failure Patients.” American College of Cardiology. March 28, 2022. acc.org/About-ACC/Press-Releases/2022/03/28/18/13/Spirituality-Can-Improve-Quality-of-Life-for-Heart-Failure-Patients
Srinivas, S., Anand, K., & Chockalingam, A. (2020). “Longitudinal association between adolescent negative emotions and adulthood cardiovascular disease risk: an opportunity for healthcare quality improvement. [Opportunity for healthcare quality improvement]” Benchmarking, 27(8), 2323-2339. doi.org/10.1108/BIJ-01-2020-0028
Vlachakis C, Dragoumani, et al. “Human Emotions on the Onset of Cardiovascular and Small Vessel Related Diseases.” In Vivo. 2018 Jul-Aug;32(4):859-870. doi: 10.21873/invivo.11320. PMID: 29936471; PMCID: PMC6117769.
Zhang G, Zhang Q, Li F. “The impact of spiritual care on the psychological health and quality of life of adults with heart failure: a systematic review of randomized trials.” Frontiers in Medicine (Lausanne). 2024 Apr 17;11:1334920. doi: 10.3389/fmed.2024.1334920. PMID: 38695025; PMCID: PMC11062134.
Over the last eight months, I have specialized in spiritual and emotional care for heart patients in the hospital. There is a clear link between spirituality, heart disease, quality of life, and life satisfaction. Caring for your heart is caring for your spirituality. From my experience in the hospital, patients often have very intense emotional and spiritual concerns that are often far more dire than even their heart condition.
As I have spent time with patients and families in the Cardiovascular units, I became curious, specializing in care for these patients over the last eight months. The physical distress of a major heart condition or disease are what brings these patients to these units, but my job as a Chaplain is to attend to the spiritual and emotional needs of these patients. I have been tracking many shared Common Stressors, which I would describe as "A Hardening of the Heart"
This video offers some of those insights, and I would invite your conversation about the links between spirituality, emotionality, and heart health.
Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:41 Grounding in Research
04:16 Specializing in Care for Heart Patients
05:26 Connection between Heart Health and Emotions
07:18 Softening the Heart
08:42 Holistic Care
09:15 Parallel Process for Me
References
DeSteno, David. Emotional Success: The Power of Gratitude, Compassion, and Pride. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2018.
Moeini M, Ghasemi TM, Yousefi H, Abedi H. The effect of spiritual care on spiritual health of patients with cardiac ischemia. Iran J Nurs Midwifery Res. 2012 Mar;17(3):195-9. PMID: 23833611; PMCID: PMC3696210. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3696210
Roth, Sam. “Spirituality Can Improve Quality of Life for Heart Failure Patients.” American College of Cardiology. March 28, 2022. acc.org/About-ACC/Press-Releases/2022/03/28/18/13/Spirituality-Can-Improve-Quality-of-Life-for-Heart-Failure-Patients
Srinivas, S., Anand, K., & Chockalingam, A. (2020). “Longitudinal association between adolescent negative emotions and adulthood cardiovascular disease risk: an opportunity for healthcare quality improvement. [Opportunity for healthcare quality improvement]” Benchmarking, 27(8), 2323-2339. doi.org/10.1108/BIJ-01-2020-0028
Vlachakis C, Dragoumani, et al. “Human Emotions on the Onset of Cardiovascular and Small Vessel Related Diseases.” In Vivo. 2018 Jul-Aug;32(4):859-870. doi: 10.21873/invivo.11320. PMID: 29936471; PMCID: PMC6117769.
Zhang G, Zhang Q, Li F. “The impact of spiritual care on the psychological health and quality of life of adults with heart failure: a systematic review of randomized trials.” Frontiers in Medicine (Lausanne). 2024 Apr 17;11:1334920. doi: 10.3389/fmed.2024.1334920. PMID: 38695025; PMCID: PMC11062134.
