History of Chaplain Services and Education at Duke Hospital
In 1925, James B. Duke willed $4 million to establish Duke University Hospital (DUH) and its medical and nursing schools. His goal: to improve health care in the Carolinas, then a poor rural region lacking in hospitals and health care providers. Two years later, construction began on the original hospital (now known as the Duke Clinic), which opened in 1930 with 400 beds. Through the years, DUH has continued to honor James B. Duke’s vision by bringing extraordinary discoveries to clinical fruition, delivering cutting-edge clinical services to patients, applying care and compassion that brings dignity and respect to all stages of care, and maintaining an unwavering focus on making the individuals and communities we serve healthier.
Today DUH is the flagship of DUHS and a full-service, 957-bed, three million square foot tertiary and quaternary academic medical center. DUH is a recognized leader in providing the highest quality care to the people we serve. This care is delivered with inspiring passion and a deep commitment to put the person who needs our care at the center of everything we do.
History of the Department
In 1955, Duke Divinity School professor Dr. Russell Dicks began implementing the action-reflection-action model of training during joint hospital visits with Duke Divinity School students. In this pre-cursor of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) he and his students would discuss and critique the ministry provided. Dick’s methods and ideas about pastoral psychology, counseling, and ministry to the sick made him an innovator in his field. His first book, The Art of Ministering to the Sick (1936) co-written with Dr. Richard C. Cabot, took a new approach to patient care by encouraging the partnership of doctors and chaplains.
Dicks stressed the importance of listening to the patient and addressing individual needs. He had a unique insight into the patient experience: during his twenties he suffered from tuberculosis, and it was his illness and long hospital stays that sparked a desire to pursue a career in pastoral care. He also emphasized the importance of communication between pastors and physicians, contending that a patient’s physical, spiritual, and emotional wellness are best addressed by the professions working together. As he notes in “The Growing Edge of the Relationship between Physicians and Pastors,” written during his time at Duke, “good medical care means using all of the resources we have for the benefit of our people.”
In 1956, Professor Dicks helped create a half-time position for a hospital chaplain with the financial support of the United Methodist conferences in North Carolina. He persuaded one of his former students, Rev. P. Wesley Aitken, to accept the position at Duke on July 01, 1956. Over the next several years, Duke moved to employ Wes full time, with his salary and support provided by Duke University Hospital.
Early in his tenure, Wes began to work toward creating a center for clinical training under the auspices of the Council for Clinical Training. The 1980s United Methodist Communications production “What is a Chaplain?“ Wes’ style of “pastoral care and conversation” is beautifully captured and available on YouTube, this video is shown at the top of this page as well.
From 1956 – 1964, Wes lead Duke University Hospitals’ “Independent Clinical Pastoral Education Program”. In 1964, he led Duke to accreditation with the Institute of Pastoral Care. When the Institute for Pastoral Care joined with several others to form the Association for Clinical Pastoral Education in 1968, Duke became an ACPE accredited training program. These years later became known as the formative years as Wes worked to create and maintain the physical facilities and philosophical space within the hospital to balance the provision of patient focused pastoral care with the development of a “cutting-edge” training program for the next generation of pastoral care providers.
As the department established a national reputation through the mid 1970’s the department’s scope of care and education grew to include three CPE Educators in addition to the director, a position for Supervisory Education student and ten chaplain resident positions. Throughout his time at Duke University Hospital, Wes maintained a close working relationship with Duke Divinity School as evidenced in the development of a Th.M. degree program in Pastoral Psychology.
Wes trained and developed a host of leaders in the field of Pastoral Care during his tenure including: Bob Black, Bob Love, Henry Flowers, Fred Reid, Dick Goodling, Bob Claydor, Will Spong, White Iddings, Leo Thompson, David Franzen and Peter Keese. The P. Wesley Aitken Endowment was created to support Duke University Hospital’s goal of training spiritual care providers.
Upon Wes’ retirement in 1987, The Reverend. Dr. James L. Travis III was appointed as both the Director of Chaplain Service and Education and as an Associate Professor of Pastoral Care in the Duke Divinity School. Jim’s strong ties to Duke Divinity School were the hallmark of his tenure. During his time, several hundred students participated in a single CPE unit, the residency program and/or the Supervisory CPE program. In the 1990’s, even with substantial changes within health care and Duke Medical Center, the Department of Pastoral Services continued to grow. As part of Jim’s work at the Divinity School, he served as the founding director of the joint M.Div./MSW program.
While here, Jim prioritized the provision of pastoral care in the hospital as the primary mission of Pastoral Services. Under his leadership programs such as the grant- funded Partners-in-Caring (AIDS outreach program), Bereavement Services, Decedent Care, and the Hospital Ethics Committee were established and either located within or linked to Pastoral Services. After serving the Department for 19 years, Jim Travis retired in 2006.
In 2006 after serving at Duke for almost twenty years, Jim retired from Duke and became the Regional Director for the Mid-Atlantic Region of the ACPE. He held this part-time job for ten years. In the Mid-Atlantic Region ACPE, he was known as a kind pastoral care provider and a thoughtful leader.
Upon Jim’s retirement, The Reverend Deborah Morgan was appointed as Interim Director. She came into the position after years of service as Chaplain to the Cancer Center. Debbie’s approach and legacy provided stability and respectful engagement with staff which helped smooth a transition that took over a year to complete.
Following a national search, The Reverend Dr. Jim Rawlings, Jr. was hired as the third director of the program in January of 2008. Jim, a Duke Divinity School alumna and former associate director of the department, brought a deep appreciation for the department’s history and a creative vision for its future.
Jim’s lasting legacies include his development of the CPE program at sister hospital Duke Raleigh which has now become accredited with the ACPE. He is also known and appreciated for his commitment to students in the Parish-Based CPE Unit for Duke Divinity School students. His legacy will live on in his clear and focused departmental policies, and his leadership in engaging various aspects of Pastoral Care research. While Director, Jim served as both an architect and founding member of the Caring for Each Other (CEO) initiative. While with the CEO pilot program Jim provided crisis care to hundreds of staff members helping both develop and deploy Duke University Hospital’s vision of caring for staff. One of Jim’s roles outside of Duke was that of Chair of Certification for the Mid-Atlantic Region of ACPE. Individuals seeking certification with the ACPE knew and appreciated Jim for his intentional and deliberate leadership. In July of 2018, Jim Rawlings retired.
Upon Jim Rawlings’ retirement in 2018, Duke University Hospital hired Reverend Dr. John P. Oliver, a graduate of Duke University Hospital’s CPE Residency and Supervisory training program to serve as the Director of Chaplain Services and Education.
John is interested in exploring how data might be used to tell the story of how Chaplain Services and Education supports Duke University Hospital in reaching the mission of caring for our patients, their loved ones and each other.
Other departmental projects for John include: researching Family Presence during resuscitation events, researching how to provide spiritual care in DUH’s outpatient clinic settings, creating a Bilingual (Spanish/English) CPE program, and working with the Duke Divinity School (DDS) to create a DDS “Chaplain Certificate” program.