Rest Stop
Retreats give parish nurses a breather and offer an opportunity to relax, replenish and pick up tools for their own health

By Melissa Gaskill
June 5, 2003


Not long ago, a medical center in a small North Dakota town received a call from a widow living alone on a farm. She offered to pay for someone to call her every day, just to make sure she was still alive. The medical center contacted a local parish nurse, who connected the widow with another woman who lived in a nursing home. This woman had limited mobility because of arthritis, but she could use the phone. Now, one woman has a purpose, and the other feels connected.

That kind of human touch is integral to parish nursing, which is a professional model of health ministry that integrates the practice of faith with the practice of nursing because, although not all communities have hospitals or clinics, most have places of worship. A link between the faith community and health care, parish nurses aid in education, provide health screenings and coordinate volunteer services.

"Parish nurses truly embrace holistic care-body, mind and spirit," said Sarah Baker, RN, coordinator of Dakotas Parish Nursing in Mitchell, S.D. "You may pray with someone. Sometimes, you act as an advocate. You take people to appointments who get lost in the system and don't understand what they are being told."

It is work that can be wearing and stressful, and many parish nurses are part-time volunteers who have paying nursing jobs as well. So, in many areas, they are forming networks and holding retreats to provide the support and renewal these nurses need to keep going.

Two networks have been established in South Dakota, according to Baker, and one of those already has organized two retreats.

Recharge the batteries

"We need that as caregivers. We can't care for people well if we don't care for ourselves," Baker said, "but caregivers are so often cared for last. It is important for nurses to model health for the people they serve, and you can't preach it as effectively if you aren't living it." Retreats help by providing an opportunity for nurses to recharge their batteries and, through speakers and exercises, pick up new tools for their own health.

The South Dakota retreats took place at camps in beautiful areas. The agenda is kept uncluttered, with no continuing education time. Baker is considering a retreat that will focus on the concept of Sabbath time, based on the book Sabbath: Finding Rest, Renewal, and Delight in Our Busy Lives by Wayne Muller.

A recent retreat for the Greater Memphis (Tenn.) Parish Nurse Network was titled "Souls Knit Together: Friendships and Peer Spiritual Guidance in the Christian Community." The objectives, said Anna Abuelouf, RN, director of community health ministry for the Catholic Diocese of Memphis, were to experience the peace of contemplation and joy with fellow nurses, and to have a better sense of how to establish and maintain a sacred community.

Presenter Cindy Schwartz, Ph.D., director of Living Waters House in Brownsville, Tenn., often leads retreats for the Presbyterian Church (USA). The day-long retreat, open to anyone engaged or interested in parish nursing, included personal and group exercises, in addition to Schwartz's presentations.

Gail Kittleson, resource faculty at Eastern Oregon University, leads retreats for a variety of groups, including parish nurses.

"I've found parish nurses to be especially sensitive and caring people," Kittleson said. "In my own experience, caregiver types don't deal with their own grief well, but carry it around. So, perhaps they have a special need for that chance to be in a confidential, safe place to deal with grief. The main gift I give in my retreats is to process some of that old stuff and leave it behind."

Kittleson's retreats use journaling extensively, and she gives attendees handouts they can use back on the job, such as a "grief bill of rights" that outlines what grieving people have a right to expect and plan for.

Baker worked for several years in the ICU and also saw firsthand that nurses don't always have healthy ways of dealing with grief. This can be a particular problem with parish nurses, because so often they are involved in grief ministry, keeping families informed, providing them with support and resources, even being part of funerals or memorials.

Yet they may not have the support and resources that, say, hospice nurses do. Retreats help fill that gap.

Refresh and restore

Baker said one of the key ingredients for a successful retreat is a restful setting. "You need a place where tension drains out and you feel refreshed and restored. We turn off our cell phones and get away from the rat race. We talk about the stories; it's like a debriefing. We talk about how it feels when you don't know what to say, or you can't pray with a family or spend time with them."

Retreats could be beneficial for all kinds of nurses, she said. "You could arrange one through a pastor and have a church host it for a day. It could even be just a meal together."

"The benefit of a retreat over a workshop setting is the time and the activities to step back and regroup before learning something new," Kittleson said.

A concept developed in the mid-1980s, parish nursing was designated as a specialty by the American Nurses Association Congress of Nursing Practice in 1997 and has grown to as many as 6,000 nurses around the country, most of them BSN-prepared with more than 10 years of experience in nursing. A variety of denominations-Catholic, Lutheran, Presbyterian and others-are involved in supporting and providing parish nursing service in their communities.

Last year, a program in Memphis trained about 170 RNs from 80 churches in 27 denominations. More than 1,500 have been trained through a program at Marquette University in Milwaukee.

The Catholic Diocese of Memphis' Community Health Ministry has a basic preparation course that 172 nurses from 30 different denominations and faith groups have completed since 1998. Some nursing schools, like the one at Union University in Memphis, offer parish nursing as an elective clinical experience.

The practice of parish nursing has a variety of models, too. Many nurses are volunteers, Baker said, working five hours a week or more, depending on whether they need income from another job. Some parish nurses are paid, supported either by individual congregations, groups of churches or health systems. MeritCare Health System, for example, supports about 28 nurses in the Dakotas and Minnesota.

"Parish nursing looks as different as does every congregation," Baker said. "It is probably one of the most diverse nursing practices there is."

Contact Melissa Gaskill at gaskill@dbcity.com