A team of Clinton School students has spent the academic year working with the Arkansas Faith-Academic Initiatives for Transforming Health (FAITH) network. Samantha Black (Fort Smith, Ark.) and Taylor Donnerson (West Memphis, Ark.) are creating an end-of-life planning toolkit for leaders of faith-based organizations to implement within their congregations.
The FAITH Network is a collaboration of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and faith organizations in Arkansas that provides an infrastructure to support faith-based research and the delivery of health programs education within faith communities across the state. This is the second straight year that a Clinton School team has partnered with the FAITH Network. Last year, a team compiled a database of mental health resources to share with faith-based organizations within central Arkansas.
Both teams were supervised by Keneshia Bryant-Moore, Ph.D., A.P.R.N., Assistant Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and associate professor in the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education of the Fay W. Boozman College of Public. Bryant-Moore said the idea for this year’s project came directly from discussions with her colleagues at UAMS.
“It actually stemmed from the hospital staff,” Bryant-Moore said. “I had a few conversations with some of the leadership at UAMS on the medical center side and they were talking about the challenges they have as far as educating people around end-of-life planning. We looked around Arkansas and the percentages are very low for the number of people who have end-of-life plans, and the ones who have developed it often have not taken that extra step of getting it to their healthcare provider.”
The team’s research included talking with leaders from across the country who have initiated end-of-life planning in collaboration with faith communities. Black and Donnerson focused part of their best-practices research on Five Wishes, a legal advance directive document written for adults, regardless of age or health, to consider and document how they want to be cared for at the end of life.
The team interviewed Arkansas faith leaders to gain their perspectives on initiating Five Wishes, or a similar initiative, within the state. Donnerson said that many of the leaders agreed that advance directives and end-of-life care were important issues.
“The recommendations in our toolkit are based on the common themes across our interviews,” Donnerson said. “Pastors or faith leaders understand that there is a need for advance directives. Many of them were unfamiliar with Five Wishes but they appreciate that it goes beyond medical aspects and would like to use it for their congregation as it allows a more structured way of doing things.”
Five Wishes encourages thinking about end-of-life planning no matter the age. Donnerson noted that one of the team’s recommendations will include planning for differences in how to present the conversations with younger generations and older generations.
The team will present its findings online on Friday, April 10.
“I was excited to see that faith leaders thought this was an important issue,” Bryant-Moore said. “If they didn’t take it as something that needed to be addressed, and felt like faith community was one avenue toward respite care, it would go nowhere. It was good they thought this is an issue that needs to be discussed and the faith community is an appropriate venue to be able to do that.”
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