Reference no: EM132179984

Question of Comments: How often do you engage with or witness death in your work? How has this experience or the lack of it shaped your view of death? Has it gotten easier or harder for you to accept the fact of death? As you explain, include your clinical specialty.

Comment 1: In the recent years I have not witness death at work because of my specialty (same day surgery, chemo). Over the many years of working (med surg., cardiac), I had experienced death numerous times. When I reflected on those occasions what I do remember is that most of the patients were alone. I have heard that patients sometime wait until the family members leave before crossing over. My view of death over the years, were an end to suffering." We have de-?ned Christian nursing as a ministry of compassionate care for the whole person in response to God's grace toward a sinful world, which aims to foster optimum health (shalom) and bring comfort in suffering and death for anyone in need (Donahue,1996)". Has it got easier or harder I'm neutral, I know that death is something we all must experience. At the present time my acceptance is growing more, this course has given me a reality check, it's something we all must face. When I lost my mother unexpectedly to an accident, I watch her for two weeks on a ventilator before she was taken off. According to Elisabeth Kubler Ross my grief was anger, why did it happen and who to blame. My thought was if she hadn't gone on that yearly trip with the family, which she decided at the last minute to go, would she still be here. I had to trust my faith, that was the way she was supposed to leave this earthly body. She enjoyed going on that trip each year and she enjoyed the ocean, so she began her death process experiencing something that she enjoyed.

Reference: M. Patricia Donahue, Nursing: The Finest Art, 2nd ed. (St. Louis, Mo.: Mosby-Year Book, 1996), pp. 2-7.

Comment 2: I recently moved to a new position in Infectious Disease from a med/surg/ICU stepdown unit. I have not experienced much with death since my transfer, but experienced quite a bit more when I worked on the floor. Sometimes we would have patients that would decline quickly without enough time to move to an inpatient hospice unit, so we would take care of them on the floor until their passing. In my experience, it was much less difficult when the death was expected. It was comforting to me to know I was able to keep the patient comfortable and offer kindness and comfort to the family as they said their goodbyes and made peace. More often than this, however, was the unexpected passing of patients that coded. The unexpected deaths of patients who were seemingly doing well was much more difficult for me to accept. It was hard not to feel like you failed the patient and were not able to keep them safe. It was hard to explain to distraught family members that their loved one was gone from this earth.

I feel like my experiences with death in the work setting have made it easier to accept. I know what is going to happen to each one of us. What is more than that, however, is my personal experience with losses in the last year. I lost my best friend/sister-in-law, my father-in-law, aunt, and grandma all to illness. I also lost my brother and grandpa unexpectedly. I found the unexpected deaths so very much more difficult to handle, so much harder to come to peace with and heal from. In all of the death surrounding my life in the last year, whether work or personal life, one thing is clear to me - life is short and you just never know when it is your time to pass. I am not afraid to die, I am confident in what will happen and I think this confidence helps me to be able to better help others. Making memories with loved ones and experiencing things together has become more important to me than ever.