Carol Battye, Thomas E. Rodgerson, Ph.D.

Integrated training for medical and chaplain interns

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Given that American hospitals usually train medical and chaplain interns on separate, parallel tracks, how can the newly launched innovative community-based Clinical Pastoral Education program at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore, MD foster the integrated training of these two ancient healing arts? Based upon an eleven-week clinical rotation with medical teams at JHBMC, a chaplain intern describes, analyzes, and proposes actions to address the new ministry opportunities drawn from making integrated rounds within the patient-centered Aliki project at JHBMC.  Based on clinical experience and dialogue with medical interns and residents, the author proposes both immediate and longer-term goals to successfully integrate evidence-based bio-medical and pastoral training to the benefit of the entire hospital community.