Demystifying dying in end-of-life-care: A phenomenological perspective

This article focuses on experiences of the process of dying. The empirical material consists of interviews with patients in palliative care and their significant others. The analysis draws attention to the lived experiences of the participants - embedded in time, identities, social relations, and everyday lives - and to how the possibility of sense-making is conditioned by the lifeworld. Guided by this analysis, the article concludes that professionals can offer to help patients and significant others, as end of life may entail multi-faceted suffering, but this needs to be understood as reorienting work: supporting people when their lines become disrupted or need to be altered. This requires a display of radical empathy, that needs to be at the core of professional practice, developed in complex everyday caregiving situations. .