A unique team: "doctor and chaplain"

I dream of the day when certified chaplains who also have credentialing in counseling are made available within the practices of doctors. For the sake of showing how this works I have prepared this post. During a period of eight years such an arrangement was extended to me by Dr. Leslie Edison at Moon Valley Medical Center in Phoenix, AZ.

When this doctor invited me to work with her in her medical practice  at Moon Valley Medical Center, I was just finishing my last unit of Clinical Pastoral Education at Banner University Medical Center. Dr. Edison wanted her patients to have emotional and spiritual care alongside her medical care. 

I worked on referrals from Dr. Leslie Edison. On some occasions we worked together with patients as pictured here. During our first months of my having a practice with this marvelous doctor, I worked within any available patient room. Soon after, Dr. Edison designated a room specifically available for my practice. She either called me requesting help with a patient on an immediate basis, or Dr. Edison prepared a written request for me to call patients so an appointment could be set up. Together, we were able to accomplish amazing work with patients: the doctor cared for the patient's physical needs while I assisted with the emotional and spiritual aspects of their healing depending on what could be most helpful to the patient.

Before beginning this work together, we independently had either training in therapeutic touch (me as chaplain) and (Dr. Edison) by observing the results of therapeutic touch.  Since this was a unique approach to patient care my certifying body, National Association of Catholic Chaplains, published an article titled, "The Chaplain Is In" on the front page of Vision, the association's Monthly publication for chaplains. It is provided here for Board certified chaplains with counseling credentials who may wish to pursue such a dream as this. 

Wouldn't it be wonderful if family practices could have this doctor/chaplain-counselor arrangement available for patients and their family members? At the time, I collected my fee directly from patients. I was able to allow patients to pay based on what they could afford because Dr. Edison did not charge me for space to work in her practice. The day will come when Board-certified chaplains will be permitted codes for billing both Medicare and Medicaid. The HealthCare Chaplaincy Network is currently at work to finalize this possibility.

About the author: Joy Le Page Smith is a Board-certified chaplain with counseling credentialing. Although she has retired from her mental health counseling practice, Joy currently sees hospital patients and enjoys writing columns for newspapers and articles for her two websites: Healing-with-Joy.com and Healingwithjoy.blogspot.com