Healing the Healers: Exploring Grief in Medicine

In healthcare, grieving on the job is common and often goes unaddressed, leading to prolonged and compounded emotional distress among healthcare professionals. Reflecting on personal narratives written by healthcare providers and trainees working in emergency medicine, pediatrics, and other medical specialties, I highlight how grief can be prolonged when anticipated, chronic, delayed, or inhibited and how it may be influenced by the closeness of the patient-provider relationship, relatable circumstances in the patient or family's life, and the level of support provided by colleagues, peers, and institutions. The NIB narratives emphasize the need for better support systems, particularly for early career-stage workers, and stress the importance of addressing grief to foster well-being and job satisfaction. Fewer narratives by more experienced professionals were included in the narrative symposium, hinting that as a coping strategy, healthcare professionals may eventually develop enhanced compartmentalization skills to deal with emotionally difficult cases. Finally, I highlight how, for many of the authors, their experiences with grief have been professionally formative, and I briefly reflect upon my own personal experience with grieving on the job while working in the emergency department at a level-one trauma center.