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Responses > 402-2022

Freedom of Information request 402-2022

Response published: 1 April 2023

FOI Request

I would like to know whether NHS chaplains at the trust or other NHS chaplains have made comments after seeing patients who believe themselves to be possessed. Please send me all case notes and/or email correspondence from 2022 which describes an NHS chaplain commenting on a patient and includes any of the following words: Possessed, spirit, jinn, jin, gin, shayatin, afarit, exorcism, devil, satan, satanic, demon, evil, infestation, subjection, spectra, occult, witch, Iblis, nafs, waswās, dybbuk, zebola, awre, sagwara, shaitani, gamba, kitimiri, inwatso, loa, iwa, chwal, māra, kuei, shaman, Bhūtavidyā, Bhaironji, peye, setan, Please also send case notes and/or email correspondence from 2022 which describes an NHS chaplain commenting on a patient and includes any of the same words in their plural forms.

FOI Response

Thank you for your FOI request.
As far as we are aware, we have not used any of these words in patient records or in emails, because we only note when we have spoken with a patient and do not include any details of the conversation we have had, in line with the Trust’s confidentiality policy and good chaplaincy practice. The only times we include any detail of a conversation we have had with a patient in notes or emails is with their expressed consent, or at their request, and the term “possession” or the like. has not been recorded in this way.