Chaplaincy and faith services

Our chaplaincy team offers confidential religious, spiritual, and pastoral care to all patients, visitors, and staff across our five hospital sites, during normal working hours and as a 24/7 urgent out-of-hours on-call service.

Changes to chaplaincy services during the coronavirus pandemic

The chaplaincy service continues to operate with some changes to our usual service. Our chapels and prayer rooms at Charing Cross, Hammersmith and St Mary’s hospitals remain open for private use only by patients, their visitors and staff on site. Please maintain a distance of two metres from others to stop the spread of infection.

Acts of public worship are not permitted under the Government’s current lockdown regulations.

Patients can request a chaplain visit through ward staff or call the spiritual and pastoral care service directly.

The chaplaincy team also provide a 24/7 emergency patient service for end of life situations or for people who are experiencing extreme distress.

Chaplaincy services

The chaplaincy service provides religious, spiritual, and pastoral care and support to patients, their families and visitors, and hospital staff in the often difficult circumstances of admission to hospital, especially in the context of life-changing or life-limiting injury or illness. We visit on the wards, pray for and with patients and staff, perform religious rituals, especially at or near the end of life, hold services in the chapels and prayer rooms, and can provide religious texts and devotional items such as prayer books and rosaries.

We will usually arrange to visit during normal working hours (Sunday to Friday, 09.00 – 17.00, subject to availability), and offer a 24/7 urgent call-out service for end-of-life situations or in case of particular distress.

Contacting the chaplaincy service

To request a visit either during normal working hours or in an urgent situation out of hours, please speak to a member of staff and ask them to contact the on-call chaplain. Alternatively, please call 020 3312 1508, leaving a voicemail message if necessary. The voicemail is checked regularly in and out of hours, but in case of any urgent need, please ask the staff on the ward concerned to contact the on-call chaplain direct rather than leaving a voicemail message. You can also email, imperial.chaplains@nhs.net

Facilities

There are Christian chapels, Muslim prayer rooms, and quiet rooms on each of our main sites, for use by patients, their families and visitors, and by staff. Services are held in the chapels and prayer rooms on each site. For information about these and other chaplaincy facilities on each site, please follow the links below.

• Chaplaincy facilities at Charing Cross Hospital
• Chaplaincy facilities at St Mary’s Hospital
• Chaplaincy facilities at Hammersmith Hospital
  
  

The chaplaincy team

The chaplaincy team is made up of Anglican, Jewish, Muslim, and Roman Catholic chaplains. Representatives from other religions and traditions will be contacted on request. Your own minister is welcome to visit you in hospital, subject to any particular arrangements that are in place on the ward or hospital site concerned. During the COVID19 pandemic, any minister wishing to visit a patient in hospital is advised to contact the chaplaincy service, or speak to the nurse in charge of the ward concerned, before travelling to the hospital to avoid a wasted journey in the event that it is not possible for a visit to be made.

Fr Giles Pinnock, Head of Spiritual & Pastoral Care and Roman Catholic chaplain	Revd Michele Lee, Senior Anglican chaplain
Fr Blaise Amadi, Senior Roman Catholic chaplain	Rabbi Ari Cohen, Senior Jewish chaplain
Imam Shahid Hussain, Senior Muslim chaplain	Fr Benedict Abuo, Roman Catholic chaplain,
Imam Abdul-Karim Al-Tamimy, Muslim chaplain	Veronica Burns, Roman Catholic chaplain
Ouafa Choufani, Muslim chaplain	Fr Gladson Dabre, Roman Catholic chaplain
Frank Franklin LLM, Anglican chaplain	Shanaz Khanche, Muslim chaplain
Revd Margaret Legg, Anglican chaplain