Loss and terminal illness

The experience of terminal illness can best be viewed as a situation of multiple losses involving the dying person, family members and friends, and the health care providers engaged in offering services to them. It is a major transition during which the central participants must cope with the personal meanings of the forthcoming death as well as other losses brought about by the disease process, medical treatments, and the need to provide care for the dying person. How families adapt to the stresses and changes imposed by the experience of living with dying depends on their previous experiences with death, their established patterns of communication about serious matters, and their decision-making practices. Some individuals and families are at greater risk than others for developing maladaptive responses and behaviors during and after the experience of terminal illness. Risk factors to be considered in making hypotheses about the potential for maladaptive reactions include the strength of the attachment to the dying person, uncontrollable and distressing symptoms, and coping limitations associated with age and other factors contributing to increased vulnerability to the demands of continuous change. Working effectively with different kinds of families during the transition of terminal illness can best be accomplished within a conceptual framework built upon knowledge about people undergoing change. The concept of safe conduct can serve as an overall guide for the creation of nursing services designed to offer personalized care and accessibility of professional help at times of maximum need by the family. Assisting dying patients and their families toward the achievement of their personal goals is fundamental to the idea of safe conduct. The delivery of nursing care in terminal illness requires an orientation to assessment as an ongoing process that makes use of knowledge about disease processes, medical treatments, individual and group adaptations to loss, risk factors suggestive of maladaptive responses, and family dynamics in relation to crisis and change. Although nurses bring expert knowledge about available treatments and resources, the process of assessment and decision-making about what needs to be done can be best accomplished through a process of contracting with the patient and family. These mutual agreements need to be concerned with the establishment of specific goals, plans for achieving them, available resources within the family, division of responsibility, time limits on the achievement of objectives, and mutual evaluation of the process and the outcomes.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)