Nation-Wide Guidelines for Multidisciplinary Spiritual Care: Implementation of the Netherlands' Spiritual Care Guidelines and Grief Guidelines

Spiritual care is the focus of the Netherlands’ Spiritual Care Guidelines and is a central dimension in the Netherlands’ Grief Guidelines. The objective of this chapter is to describe implementation of both evidence-based palliative care guidelines. In so doing, we draw from scientific evidence and from our experience taking several roles. We will highlight some content of both guidelines, after which we will describe what implementation minimally requires: (a) an early involvement of stakeholders, who represent relevant organisations, taking place from early development until authorisation of guidelines, (b) an emphasis on the guidelines’ multidisciplinary nature, (c) education aimed at professionals developing spiritual care competency and multidisciplinary collaboration in spiritual care, and (d) investment in scientific research, with special attention paid to patient outcomes. We will finish the chapter with a description of a patient journey that highlights topics central to spiritual care, and contextual features that shape and are shaped by implementation. We conclude that more research on implementation of spiritual care guidelines is necessary and that in our country, sustaining ongoing implementation of spiritual care remains necessary. Our hope is that this chapter helps readers to contribute to a successful implementation of spiritual care into palliative care.