HSM's 2nd Annual Conference with Dr. Kathleen Rusnak

Approximately 300 people gathered at The Landing in Scarborough for HSM’s 2nd Annual Conference. This year’s speaker, Dr. Kathleen Rusnak, gave an introspective and reflective talk on spiritual care for Alzheimer’s patients and for combat veterans at end of life. The day was balanced with music, poetry and dance. Dr. Rusnak gave us valuable tools that could be put into practice immediately.

Before They Forget: Recognizing and Maximizing the Spiritual Possibilities of Alzheimer’s

After a person is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, new spiritual dimensions emerge. When identified and described, these dimensions can offer possibilities for the patient and caregivers to deepen their connections with each other and live life more fully before the loss of memory permanently transforms the relationship. Sharing stories, reflections, and insights from her work with hospice patients and parishioners, Dr. Rusnak opened the door to a deeper look at the spiritual world of Alzheimer’s.

Inner Battles Combat Soldiers Wage: Spiritual Issues and End of Life

The world of the combat veteran is not a world that a non-combat civilian can ever know. Most of us in a position to help veterans who have been in combat and are now at the end of their life have never been in combat ourselves. We have never been in a war. We do not know the inner spiritual struggles of the combat veterans as they engage in combat and war activities. They have seen “what no person should ever see,” and have done “what no person thinks they will ever do,” and they dwell on “what I did not do.” We are not aware of how the should of the veteran has been tested, changed, or damaged; or how the veterans’ wartime experiences impact their civilian world. At the end of life, combat veterans are left with the unfinished spiritual issues that have impacted their civilian lives since their return from war. This presentation focused on those issues.