Our Mahi/Work

We will examine the current Aotearoa New Zealand spiritual care environment to understand how spiritual care can be improved across our healthcare systems at a policy, institutional and practice level.

What do we want to know?

  • There are two questions we are looking to answer with this research:

    1. In the emerging Aotearoa New Zealand healthcare systems, how can spiritual care services be best structured and integrated to achieve the provision of inclusive, equitable, holistic care for all people?

    2. What does excellent, inclusive, culturally safe spiritual care look like and mean in practice in Aotearoa New Zealand?

  • To answer our research questions we have mapped out four objectives:

    1. To understand the existing spiritual care needs in Aotearoa New Zealand.

    2. To understand Aotearoa New Zealand spiritual care practitioners’ existing spiritual care provision.

    3. To investigate how spiritual care might be best provided to Aotearoa New Zealand’s diverse population as informed by Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

    4. To develop consensus-based spiritual care recommendations and an action plan for Aotearoa New Zealand healthcare.

What are we doing?

Phase One: Whanaungatanga

July 2024 - March 2025

In this phase we will be connecting with communities around Aotearoa New Zealand to start a national conversation about spiritual care.

January 2025 - September 2026

Phase Two: Mapping the Spiritual Care Environment

In this phase we will map out the spiritual care needs of communities and what the current provisioning of this looks like.

Phase Three: National Wānanga

January 2027 - March 2027

In this phase we will be bringing together key communities to develop an action plan for creating change within current health system.