This extraordinary compendium of religious traditions is invaluable to all healthcare providers. The user-friendly resource contains specific and detailed information on faith traditions vital for providing optimal spiritual care in a clinical setting. A series of inspirational introductory chapters promote the importance of spiritual well-being as a vital component in whole person care, but the majority of the book forms a compilation of articles from a wide-ranging expert panel of contributors. Ideal for quick reference, the A-Z organisation from American Indian Spirituality to Zoroastrianism is presented in a clear and logical format, covering: History and Facts Basic Teachings Basic Practices Principles for Clinical Care . Dietary Issues . General Medical Beliefs . Specific Medical Issues . Gender and Personal Issues Principles for Spiritual Care Through the Cycles of Life Concepts of Living and Dying for Spiritual Support . During Birth . During Illness . During End of Life Care of the Body Organ and Tissue Donation Scriptures, Inspirational Readings and Prayers

This extraordinary compendium of religious traditions is invaluable to all healthcare providers. The user-friendly resource contains specific and detailed information on faith traditions vital for providing optimal spiritual care in a clinical setting. A series of inspirational introductory chapters promote the importance of spiritual well-being as a vital component in whole person care, but the majority of the book forms a compilation of articles from a wide-ranging expert panel of contributors. Ideal for quick reference, the A-Z organisation from American Indian Spirituality to Zoroastrianism is presented in a clear and logical format, covering: History and Facts Basic Teachings Basic Practices Principles for Clinical Care . Dietary Issues . General Medical Beliefs . Specific Medical Issues . Gender and Personal Issues Principles for Spiritual Care Through the Cycles of Life Concepts of Living and Dying for Spiritual Support . During Birth . During Illness . During End of Life Care of the Body Organ and Tissue Donation Scriptures, Inspirational Readings and Prayers

Recent experimental progress has enabled cold atomic gases to be studied at nano-kelvin temperatures, creating new states of matter where quantum degeneracy occurs - Bose-Einstein condensates and degenerate Fermi gases. Such quantum states are of macroscopic dimensions. This book presents the phase space theory approach for treating the physics of degenerate quantum gases, an approach already widely used in quantum optics. However, degenerate quantum gases involve massive bosonic and fermionic atoms, not massless photons. The book begins with a review of Fock states for systems of identical atoms, where large numbers of atoms occupy the various single particle states or modes. First, separate modes are considered, and here the quantum density operator is represented by a phase space distribution function of phase space variables which replace mode annihilation, creation operators, the dynamical equation for the density operator determines a Fokker-Planck equation for the distribution function, and measurable quantities such as quantum correlation functions are given as phase space integrals. Finally, the phase space variables are replaced by time dependent stochastic variables satisfying Langevin stochastic equations obtained from the Fokker-Planck equation, with stochastic averages giving the measurable quantities. Second, a quantum field approach is treated, the density operator being represented by a distribution functional of field functions which replace field annihilation, creation operators, the distribution functional satisfying a functional FPE, etc. A novel feature of this book is that the phase space variables for fermions are Grassmann variables, not c-numbers. However, we show that Grassmann distribution functions and functionals still provide equations for obtaining both analytic and numerical solutions. The book includes the necessary mathematics for Grassmann calculus and functional calculus, and detailed derivations of key results are provided.