In 2025, Duke Perinatal expanded its integrated model to include Chaplain Services and recently welcomed Chaplain Fellow Kristen R. Ward to its team. This augmentation of the care model at the clinic makes chaplaincy available to staff and patients of all worldviews and belief systems. The new aspect allows for a holistically coordinated system that recognizes spiritual and existential needs as integral to this particular patient population’s overall health and care.
"My work at the Duke Perinatal Clinic continues the initiative that began with the program's inaugural augmented care model — the goal of which is to provide spiritual and emotional care to the patients, their families and the staff — started by Rev. Alyson Anderson Tiwari, M.Div," said Ward.
The time period before, during and after pregnancy carries great possibility and great unknown. Many pregnancy experiences end in life and joy, and other end in grief and loss. Some are a combination of both. Patients and families passing through this journey benefit from integrated care so they feel supported as a whole people. Chaplain presence helps provide non-judgmental, integrative support. This support shows up in a range of ways, from bearing witness to individual labor and birth stories, offering support in bereavement, providing counsel during complicated medical decision making, and sharing skills to cope with life adjustments related to pregnancy and child-rearing.
During times of illness, trauma or end-of-life care, chaplaincy contributes to this clinic’s integrated health care model by addressing spiritual distress, facilitation of meaning-making, religious needs and existential concerns that can come with the work and care of people who are pregnant in this specific journey, she notes.