Why Nurses Should Be Skilled Clinicians, Advocates, And Guides When Caring For Someone Who Is Dying

This author’s personal perceptions concerning patients facing a lingering terminal illness, have been shaped by over 20 years of critical care nursing experience. Facing death and illness on a daily basis requires self-examination and a high degree of comfort with one’s own mortality, limits and values. Constant exposure to the fragility of life forces respect for the whole person and the people who love them. A general approach to patients who are actively dying is to allow them to define what they want and need during this time. The nurse’s role

On reading this article and identifying the study, there was a clear insight on how death and dying, and even improved health, impacted those nurses (Conte, 2014). Nurses, who worked closely with their patients, through the perils and suffering, culminating of death and losses, had grief not readily explored to enable that comfort zone (Conte, 2014).

Death is inevitable. It is one of the only certainties in life. Regardless, people are often uncomfortable discussing death. Nyatanga (2016) posits that the idea of no longer existing increases anxiety and emotional distress in relation to one’s mortality. Because of the difficulty in level of care for end-of-life patients, the patient and the family often need professional assistance for physical and emotional care. Many family caregivers are not professionally trained in medicine, and this is where hospice comes into play. Hospice aims to meet the holistic needs of both the patient and the patient’s family through treatment plans, education, and advocacy. There is a duality of care to the treatment provided by hospice staff in that they do not attempt to separate the patient’s care from the family’s care. Leming and Dickinson (2011) support that hospice, unlike other clinical fields, focuses on the patient and the family together instead of seeing the patient independent of the family. Many times in hospitals, the medical team focuses solely on the goal of returning the patient back to health in order for them to return to their normal lives. They do not take into account the psychological and spiritual components of the patient’s journey and the journey that the family must take as well. For treatment of the patient, Leming and Dickinson agree that hospice does not attempt to cure patients, and instead concentrates solely

Caring for patients at the end of life is a challenging task that requires not only the consideration of the individual as a whole but also an understanding of the

Caring for patients at the end of life is a challenging task that requires not only the consideration of the patient as a whole but also an understanding of the family, social, legal, economic, and institutional circumstances that surround patient care.

Nurses: Assist the patients and families to cope with the end-of-life process such as assessing and

Dr. Ira Byock’s latest book, The Best Care Possible: A Physician’s Quest to transform Care Through the End of Life, is a remarkable book written from a personal perspective as one of the foremost palliative-care physicians in the country. Dr. Byock shares stories of his experience with patients in his clinical experience to illustrate how end-of-life care affects each person. He explains what palliative care really is and how to make humane choices in a world obsessed with conquering death. Byock presents an agenda for end-of-life care that stresses compassion, dignity, and each patient being viewed as a unique case with the opportunity to partake in shared decisions amongst a team of professionals and family members. Dr. Byock is an advocate of dying well in a society marked by a fear of death; his highly personal account provides thought-provoking vignettes of how people struggle to make the right decisions in the winter of their lives. Byock urges society to embrace the reality of death and transform the medical community into an environment that will allow patients to live the last of their days in comfort with dignity and peace. This book is a vitally important piece of literature for everyone to devour with fervor. Everyone needs to understand the inevitability of death and the environment end-of-life care can present in what will be the final moments of life.

Brady, E. (1999). Stories at the hour of our death. Home Healthcare Nurse, 17 (3) (1999), pp. 176–180

It was recognised by Jevon (2009) that caring for the dying patient can be the most fulfilling whilst also most challenging times for nurses and healthcare professionals. This paper will introduce a case study based on personal experience within clinical placement, exploring and analysing the above statement. In accordance with the Nursing and Midwifery Council Guidelines (2008) names have been changed to protect patient confidentiality. The paper will seek to address issues relating to the case study examining relevant theory. Current policies and guidelines will be considered in relation to the patient. It will identify a framework involved looking at literature to assess the effectiveness against the case study. Finally, focusing on a

Nurses are expected to provide care for their patients in their most vulnerable state of illness by giving them medications, changing dressings, taking vitals and providing them with preventive education. Yet it is emotionally, physically and spiritually demanding for the nurse to provide patients with palliative care at their end-of-life state. As a result, it is important for researchers to investigate and gather data emphasizing the importance of providing palliative care to patients from a nursing perspective. In this paper, we will be analyzing the  research article titled Living with Dying in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit: A Nursing Perspective by Debbie Stayer and Joan Such Lockhart. The analysis and understanding of the article will consist in describing six critical components which are the statement of the phenomenon of interest, the purpose, the method used, the sampling, the data collection and the conclusion.

Palliative care is essential for patients who are dying. Towards an end of patient’s life, it is crucial to conserve patient dignity while giving them care. The article describes dying with dignity is maintaining individual value and worth, receiving care with respect and empathy, allowing the patient to have a voice in their dying process. And decrease physical and emotional pain, providing privacy, having an emotional connection with others, resolving all person affairs, and having access to spiritual resources (Johnston, Östlund, & Brown p.11, 2010). Every individual has a different meaning and perspective on death, which is often shaped by their background, culture, historical and social construction. Nurses

Many research studies have shown that nursing students who are placed in the palliative care unit often find difficulty coping with terminally ill patients because they feel a lack of confidence on how to care competently and compassionately towards palliative patients (Mallory, 2003). Nursing students are not ready to cope with issues of death and dying; they feel unprepared to care for this kind of patients (Johnson, Chang, & O'Brien, 2009) and they claim that caring for dying people is one of the hardest and most distressing tasks for a nurse (Allchin, 2006). According to Gibbons, Dempster, Moutray, (2010), caring for the dying is reported as the second most common source of stress for nursing students. These findings indicate that an end

Communication in my practice has helped me to have good professional relationship with my patients, to know what, how the patients and relative feels about their illness. I make use of every encounter no matter how brief to establish relationship and promote my caring needs through various communication skills whether verbal or non-verbal skills like eye contact, empathy, or active listen which create open atmosphere and establish trust between patient, relatives, and myself. This is why Ferrand et al [2008] identifies nurses as the hub of end of life care as we are in a unique position to interact with the patient, family and the physicians as we nurses spend more time with the patient than any other professionals. When I am with a patient, I make sure I am see as been there for the patient not just

The field of palliative care offers nurses unique opportunities to engage with families on multiple levels. According Stayt (as cited in Ingleton, Chatwin, Seymour & Payne, 2011), “If nurses perceive role confusion during the care of dying patients and their families this increases the degree of stress experienced, limiting effectiveness in proving care and compounding their grief response” (p. 212). Clarifying nursing roles is vital to providing quality care to patients and families. Stuart, O’Connor, Peters and Bloomer (2010) argue that the “first priority” is to provide suitable care for the patient and family thereby “reinforcing the value of palliative care” (p. 55). The purpose of this paper is to explore certain specific roles of nursing with palliative care families. A few important nursing roles when interacting with palliative care families include: counselor, educator, and advocate. The first component of this paper will examine these common nursing roles when interacting with the families of palliative care patients. Then specific challenges to these nursing roles will be evaluated. Finally, nursing implications and evidence-based interventions to overcome these role challenges will be assessed.

According to Holms et al. (2014) there is accessible, and existing literature to support end-of-life care (EOLC) in nursing, but when specifically pertaining to the intensive care unit (ICU), the literature is deficient. The concept of ICUs is to provide care for those patients with potentially fatal illnesses; however, the likelihood that EOLC is needed for patients in this unit is always a possibility. This qualitative study focused on the actual lived experiences of nurses who have provided EOLC to patients