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Chaplains

  • Serve persons of all denominations and faiths, from Catholic to Protestant to Native American and more.
  • Available to assist you 24 hours a day. If you are in the hospital, simply dial 0 and ask for a chaplain. If you are outside the hospital, dial (605) 622-5000.
  • Provide spiritual assessments and documentation.
  • Members of the health care team, serving on interdisciplinary committees.
  • Provide empathetic listening to one who is experiencing spiritual or emotional distress.
  • Assist in crisis intervention.
  • Provide religious rituals such as anointing, communion, prayer or blessings.
  • Offer support and spiritual counseling to patients and their families.
  • Offer grief ministry and counseling.
  • Contact community clergy as requested.
  • Provide ethics consultation and counseling.
  • Provide Home Health and Hospice visits to patient’s homes.
  • Facilitate unit patient support groups.
  • Facilitate discussion and planning for Advance Directives.
  • Provide bereavement calls to families who have lost loved ones.
  • Offer informational and inspirational pamphlets and material.
  • Offer educational programs to staff and the community.

Avera St. Luke's Chaplaincy Department operates under a shared leadership model. Rev. Gary Compton is director of Chaplaincy, and Sister Pat Prunty serves as Chaplaincy coordinator.

Our full-time chaplains are nationally board-certified. Local pastors and lay ministers serve as consultants and are on call. Several volunteers provide our Communion ministry and serve as department secretary staff.