Anees was formed in response to a lack of faith-specific spiritual companionship available for Muslim patients. Due to a national shortage of chaplains and the COVID-19 pandemic, many Muslim patients felt that their spiritual health and recovery was not being addressed adequately. Anees was then formed under the guidance of the Johns Hopkins Hospital Department of Spiritual Care and Chaplaincy to recruit and train volunteers from the community to visit and confer a basic level of spiritual companionship and emotional availability to these patients.

We hope to continue facilitating these patient visits because we view it as a communal responsibility to attend to the spiritual and emotional needs of our hospitalized brothers and sisters in faith. This dedication to serve has helped catalyze our expansion into multiple teaching hospitals across the nation, with a larger goal of establishing the concrete infrastructure needed to ensure health equity for patients of all backgrounds and upbringings.