Chris has had numerous small publications, including "Staying Strong" for the Alberta Be Fit for Life Network, and articles in the Myalgic Encephalomyelitis journal, Alberta Centre for Active Living journal "Wellspring", CAMera (Complementary and Alternative Medicine Education and Research Network of Alberta) Newsletter, Synchronicity magazine, and many others.  Watch for her upcoming book on energy consciousness and the management of pain and fatigue.

The Spiritual Side of Health-care Delivery - CHR Makes Faith a Part of Healing 

Graeme Morton, Calgary Herald, Sunday, September 09, 2007

Dr. Chris Carruthers is the new manager of spirituality in chronic disease management for the Calgary Health Region.When Dr. Chris Carruthers talks about the role spirituality can play in health care and healing, she speaks from the heart and from personal experience.

Carruthers joined the Calgary Health Region in mid-June to lead an initiative to better integrate spirituality into daily health-care delivery, whether it be in a hospital bed or a walk-in clinic. The program will initially focus on chronic disease management.

"I had been a competitive athlete, I'd run a marathon and had been a very healthy eater," Carruthers says. At age 38, she developed chronic fatigue syndrome, a condition that plagued her for more than seven years.

"It started out feeling like a very bad bout of the flu, but I just didn't get better," recalls Carruthers.

"I'd been raised in a strong Catholic family, but I had fallen away from organized religion. When I was ill, I found that meditation, of understanding that my body was only part of my whole being, played an important role in both dealing with my condition and in my eventual recovery."

Carruthers, 52, is now back playing tennis and ballroom dancing at a competitive level.

Focus groups of front-line CHR medical staff, including doctors, nurses and social workers, conducted last winter, indicated a strong demand for education and training in dealing with the spiritual needs of patients and caregivers.

"The spiritual side of health care has always played a major factor in palliative care," Carruthers says.

"But I think there's a feeling that, in other aspects of medicine, we have somewhat lost that connection to the spiritual side in our increasingly technological society."

Carruthers will spend much of her first year on the job gathering data from CHR employees on what's worked in the past and what gaps need to be filled in delivering the spiritual side of health care.

"We're not going into this with any set agenda. In many ways, we're breaking new ground here. And we don't want health-care providers to think of spiritual development as yet another task to handle in their already busy day," Carruthers says.

"But I firmly believe that as we work on this initiative together, it will help us reconnect to both our patients and to our colleagues. We're losing too many excellent people in health care to burn-out, and part of that is a feeling of disconnect to their spiritual side."

Born in northern Ontario, Carruthers has been involved in health care for 30 years, with special interests and expertise in integrative health and cardiac physiology.

She says many health-care providers have a strong religious/spiritual component in their personal lives but are uncomfortable talking about it in a work environment.

"And yet we know that patients feel more connected, more supported by their nurse or doctor if they see them as more than just a clinical provider of medication and advice," Carruthers adds.

Those suffering from chronic, long-term diseases often bring up profound spiritual questions. Carruthers wants to help equip health-care providers with the communication skills and the referral network to respond to those questions, whether they're at home, in a doctor's office or a hospital bed.

"You get really heartfelt, spiritual questions like, 'but I thought God was going to take care of me,' which can really throw you for a loop," says Carruthers.

"It can be a long, tough haul for patients with chronic diseases and their families. They often feel like they are letting people down. They can question their self-worth if they can't work anymore or do simple things they love such as playing with their dog."

Carruthers says sharing more information concerning the religious and dietary requirements of various faiths is important in an increasingly diverse city such as Calgary.

She adds encouraging both patients and staff to explore the spiritual aspect of their relationship is integral to the CHR's mandate of promoting physical, mental and spiritual well being.

"The spiritual component can be difficult to comprehend because it's more of a quality-of-life issue than something like pain reduction or a measurable reduction in blood pressure," says Carruthers.

"But, yes, this is a very important part of our jobs. This is all about connection, about helping our staff say 'Can I understand more of what you're feeling, what you're going through?' when they talk with a patient."

© The Calgary Herald 2007

Expressive Writing About Personal Trauma:
Self Reported Health Changes and Subject Characteristics

INTRODUCTION: Written emotional expression about traumatic events has been shown to have a wide range of physical and mental health benefits across several populations.  To clarify how this self-guided technique might be applied in the general population, this study investigated the effect of expressive writing (EW) on symptoms and mood in self-selected volunteer subjects (n=52) who had a variety of   diagnoses and health complaints. 

METHODS: Subjects were instructed to write about a distressing personal event or conflict for 20 to 30 minutes on four consecutive days.  Outcome measures were the Profile of Mood States, a symptom checklist, and visual scales of pain, vitality, diet, and sleep quality at pre-intervention, 1 week, 4 weeks, and 8 weeks after the writing exercise.  

RESULTS: Statistical analysis compared individual subjects before and after the writing intervention, and correlated subject characteristics with outcomes.  There was a 56% decrease in symptoms that was statistically significant, F(3,153) = 16.589, p < .001, and a 24% improvement in mood that was statistically significant, F(3,156) = 4.823, p < .005.  Benefits were not related to health behavior changes.  No correlation was seen between benefits and gender, age, marital status, educational status, or employment status. 

CONCLUSION: This study extends previous efficacy studies, and establishes a strong level of external validity for EW, with further clinical applications to be determined.  Expressive writing is a practical self-care healing approach that can decrease symptoms and improve mood in a wide range of people, which may have positive effects on health care utilization and other societal behaviors. 

Chris Carruthers, PhD