HONG KONG (SE): Father Patrick Sun Ing-feng, one of the hospital chaplains authorised to give essential spiritual care to patients in critical condition, hopes to be the Lord’s channel of peace and comfort to the sick in this critical time of the Covid-19 coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic.
Father Sun, who is the chaplain of Queen Elizabeth Hospital, said that because hospital visitations are prohibited because of the pandemic, only authorised chaplains are allowed to meet terminally ill patients. Each visitation has to be finished within 15 minutes to prevent a priest from becoming a close contact of a patient.
Hospital visitations have been prohibited since the outbreak of Covid-19 in January last year. At present, hospital pastoral care services are mostly conducted via phone call, video communications and text messages.
The Hospital Authority, while banning visitations, offers essential spiritual care with around 40 priests serving more than 30 hospitals. Upon the approval of an application made by the pastoral care unit of a hospital, they are allowed to enter the wards when a patient is in critical condition.
The Hospital Authority, while banning visitations, offers essential spiritual care with around 40 priests serving more than 30 hospitals. Upon the approval of an application made by the pastoral care unit of a hospital, they are allowed to enter the wards when a patient is in critical condition.
Father Sun told the Kung Kao Po that, as a hospital chaplain, he is always ready to leave Rosary Church, Tsim Sha Tsui, and head to the hospital when the Diocesan Commission for Hospital Pastoral Care calls him to administer the sacrament for a patient in critical condition.
Father Sun said he always tries to comfort a patient before administering the sacraments, but cannot talk for long due to the time limit. He said the focus of visitation is to administer the sacraments which patients need most, as they long for the presence and love of Jesus.
He said that it takes around two to six hours for a hospital to approve a visitation application, but some applicants have died while waiting.
Father Sun said he always tries to comfort a patient before administering the sacraments, but cannot talk for long due to the time limit. He said the focus of visitation is to administer the sacraments which patients need most, as they long for the presence and love of Jesus.
From February to August last year, the pastoral care units of different hospitals filed over 500 visitation applications and 87 per cent were approved. Anointing for the sick was administered to around 300 patients and baptism for 22 others.
Ivy Choi Siu-wai, executive secretary of the Diocesan Commission for Hospital Pastoral Care, said most hospital pastoral care work over the past year has been done through telephone calls which has a lot of limitations. “For example, it is hard to sense the feelings of a patient through his voice,” she said.
Choi said around 25 per cent of the wards under the Hospital Authority offer computer tablets through which patients can video-conference with their families or to pray with priests when hospital staff are available to help. She said the commission also offers support for families waiting for approval of hospital visitation, as it understands the anxiety they must feel.
In his message for the 29th World Day of the Sick which was on February 11, Pope Francis urged people to stop and listen, and to establish a direct and personal relationship with the sick.
