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Advocacy Standard of Care
for Faith Community Nurses
Prescribed acts of faith in most religious traditions include caring for one another, both within and beyond the boundaries of individual faith communities. Acting as an advocate within health and human services is a sign of faithfulness by the Faith Community Nurse. All faith traditions call for acts of advocacy; consult the writings of your faith tradition for guidance.
Advocacy is provided when a person or group is experiencing challenges getting their needs met. While health and human services within the larger community may be excellent, the consumer may confront obstacles to safe and appropriate care and service that require advocacy. Maybe they are having a difficult time being heard or the health and human service system does not routinely adjust the delivery of service to meet their needs. Traditionally consumers who benefit from nursing advocacy include the uninsured or underinsured, mentally or physically challenged, elderly, children and victims of crime. Persons whose culture, faith practices, and beliefs are different from those of the people providing the services may also require advocacy to ensure culturally appropriate care.
The Faith Community Nurse, as advocate, brings to the relationship specialized and individualized understanding of the needs of the community and its members, as well as knowledge of the health and human service delivery systems. Advocacy is defined in The Faith Community Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice (2005) as “one of the interventions that a Faith Community Nurse uses to focus on the intentional care of the spirit as a part of the process of promoting holistic health and preventing or minimizing illness in a faith community.” It is an interpersonal, skilled process wherein the Faith Community Nurse (FCN) acts on behalf of or in cooperation with the consumer to secure and to assure the delivery of high quality health and human services appropriate to their needs and beliefs. Advocacy is performed in accordance with the legal and professional standards of nursing practice, which include the consent of clients when specific decisions and actions are made on their behalf.
How do Faith Community Nurses practice advocacy?
Advocacy begins by listening to understand the needs of members of the community, both collectively and individually, and by conducting health assessments including their faith doctrines and practices. It continues by identifying unmet needs and advocating for these needs to be appropriately met. The skills of advocacy include mediating; coordinating; clarifying; resolving conflict; and assisting the person/community to acquire, interpret, and utilize health and human services information. Typically this means speaking to providers of health and human services with or for a person or group within the faith community. In addition, the advocate may need to speak to the consumer with or for the provider. Often advocacy is accomplished simply by helping clients and providers to understand the meaning of words and actions or by helping to navigate the health and human service systems. Acting as an advocate may extend to taking direct action to assure the safety and integrity of the person or group.
The role of advocacy is challenging and includes an element of risk. Advocacy has been a part of the mission of faith communities since ancient times. It includes the critical review of public policy and promotion of legislation to ensure the well-being of all creation.
Acts of advocacy
Faith Community Nurses advocate every day in their ministry. The following are some examples of acts of advocacy:
Actively listening to assess the person/community problems, goals and areas where advocacy is needed and desired.
Establishing long term relationships with members of the congregation and their family/support systems.
Facilitating communication between the family/support system and the health and human service systems.
Providing accurate information for the family/support system in order to empower the person/family to make informed decisions.
Fostering independence or interdependence within the family/support system/faith community.
Supporting the person’s decisions and advocating for the person’s desired plan of care with other professionals and healthcare agencies.
Developing action steps that flow from the faith community’s mission statement through goals and objectives.
Identifying various area health and human services to meet needs.
Determining areas of assistance/cooperation with the area health care facilities, social service agencies and the faith community.
Providing informed and accurate referrals to appropriate service providers.
Interpreting health care information.
Interpreting words and actions of health and human service systems.
Assisting persons to develop skills consistent with their faith.
Advocating for public policies and legislation that promote the well-being of populations.
References
“He has told you….what is good: and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” New Revised Standard Version Bible. Mic.6:8.
Faith Community Nursing Scope and Standards of Practice. American Nurses Association, 2005.
Bruggemann, Walter. The Prophetic Imagination. Minneapolis: Fortress P, 2001.
Mallik, M. “Advocacy in Nursing - Perceptions of Practicing Nurses.” Journal of Clinical Nursing, 6.4 (1997). 303-313.
O,Brien, Mary E. Parish Nursing Healthcare Ministry with the Church. Boston: Jones and Bartlett Publishers, Inc, 2003.
Rocklage, R. “The Personal Challenge of Advocacy.” Health Progress, 73 (2), 50-51, 64.
Developed by: Standards and Practice Committee of the Congregational Nurse Project
Beverly Driver, R.N., B.S.N., Mary Jane Fulcher, R.N. M.S.N., Cathy Hunter, R.N., M.P.H., Lucy Russell, R.N., B.S.N. and Rebecca Zechman, R.N., M.S.N. Date: July 12, 2007
Adopted: Congregational Nurse Project Board: Date July 25, 2007