Spirituality series overview and ways forward

This series of articles, which began in November 2022, has explored the intersections of spirituality with the delivery of contemporary health care within a number of healthcare and nursing environments. This eighth and last article in this series will summarise the key aspects of spiritual care as highlighted over the past few months and will suggest one or two avenues for possible future discussion, research and work. In a way, this series of articles on spirituality within health care was intended to be little more than an update of a similar series that the author wrote in 2012–2013 for this journal. Indeed, it is likely that there will be some, if not a great deal, of overlap with and repetition of some of the content of that earlier series. However, this present series is more than that: the author has tried to dig a little deeper into what spirituality is and is not, and to explore how ideas around spirituality and spiritual practices can be implemented in one's everyday working environment, regardless of where and with whom one works. This final article will revisit and summarise the contents and main points made within each of the preceding seven articles in this series and will then explore a few tentative steps relating to future discussions, research and work regarding spirituality in healthcare.