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Winner of the 2012 AJN (American Journal of Nursing) Book of the Year Award in the Hospice and Palliative Care category In the 1960s, English physician and committed Christian Cicely Saunders introduced a new way of treating the terminally ill that she called \"hospice care.\" Emphasizing a holistic and compassionate approach, her model led to the rapid growth of a worldwide hospice movement. Aspects of the early hospice model that stressed attention to the religious dimensions of death and dying, while still recognized and practiced, have developed outside the purview of academic inquiry and consideration. Meanwhile, global migration and multicultural diversification in the West have dramatically altered the profile of contemporary hospice care. In response to these developments, this volume is the first to critically explore how religious understandings of death are manifested and experienced in palliative care settings. Contributors discuss how a \"good death\" is conceived within the major religious traditions of Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Chinese religion, and Aboriginal spirituality. A variety of real-world examples are presented in case studies of a Buddhist hospice center in Thailand, Ugandan approaches to dying with HIV/AIDS, Punjabi extended-family hospice care, and pediatric palliative care. The work sheds new light on the significance of religious belief and practice at the end of life, at the many forms religious understanding can take, and at the spiritual pain that so often accompanies the physical pain of the dying person.

This book presents a variety of experience-based perspectives on working in palliative care. Emphasising the use of self and the importance of reflective practice in professional work, the book will be of relevance to professionals in medical and social care who want to gain a deeper understanding of their work and of the motivation underlying it.

Finding Dignity at the End of Life discusses the need for palliative care as a human right and explores a whole-person methodology for use in treatment. The book examines the concept of palliative care as a holistic human right from the perspective of multiple aspects of faith, ideology, culture, and nationality. Integrating a humanities-based approach, chapters provide detailed discussions of spirituality, suffering, and healing from scholars from around the world. Within each chapter, the authors address a different cultural and religious focus by examining how this topic relates to questions of inherent dignity, both ethically and theologically, and how different spiritual lenses may inform our interpretation of medical outcomes. Mental health practitioners, allied professionals, and theologians will find this a useful and reflective guide to palliative care and its connection to faith, spirituality, and culture.

Many of us within the Franciscan Family of the 21st Century – friars, sisters, seculars and all those associated win any way with the Poverello of Assisi – find ourselves surrounded by those within our own communities and families who are in need of similar accompaniment and companionship as the walk the road toward the fullness of life. And each one of us, one day, will walk the same path ourselves.

\"The nature of the care that dying patients and their families and loved ones receive is fundamentally a question of values and ends, not of technical details and means. It is fundamentally a statement about who we are as a nation and as a community, for our moral identity is nowhere better tested and tempered than in the respect and care we show to those in the twilight of life.\" (Hastings Center Report) This article defines hospice care, provides a history of end-of-life caregiving in the U.S. and examines the values involved in providing care to the dying.

Background: The need for improved spiritual care education is a national directive, prompting many nursing and medical education programs to respond with spiritual curriculum. This article reports on research that tested an educational intervention to enhance nursing and medical students' understanding of end-of-life communication with families. Method: This mixed-methods study included three reflection questions to ascertain students' attitudes about their own death and dying. Results: Many of the students' responses were spiritual in nature. Findings revealed two important misconceptions about death and one educational strategy that can be used to help students identify potential sources of spiritual discomfort in clinical situations. Conclusion: The findings offer a glimpse into the attitudes and beliefs of nursing and medical students that could influence how they view and deliver spiritual care, contributing to the evidence base for spiritual care education and curriculum. [J Nurs Educ. 2023;62(11):601–605.]

Background The concept of death is one of the most significant issues in the nursing profession. To provide effective and comprehensive end-of-life care, nursing students, as future nurses, should have spiritual well-being (SWB) and a proper attitude toward the care of dying patients (ATCODP). The present study was conducted to investigate the relationship between the level of SWB and ATCODP of Iranian nursing students in 2019. Methods This descriptive-correlational study was conducted on 139 nursing students at Bam University of Medical Sciences who were selected by the census method. To collect data, a three-part questionnaire consisting of personal information, the Paloutzian & Ellison SWB scale, and the Frommelt Attitude Toward Care of the Dying (FATCOD) scale were used. The data were analyzed by IBM SPSS version 20. Results The mean age of the participants was 21.63 ± 3.23 years. The mean score of SWB in 98 (70.5%) nursing students was moderate, and 41 of them (29.5%) had a high score. The correlation coefficient between religious and existential health with a total score of SWB was 88% and 86%, respectively. According to Pearson’s test, a significant relationship was observed between ATCODP, SWB, and its dimensions ( P  < 0.05). Conclusion A significant relationship was observed between ATCODP, SWB, and its dimensions. Considering that most nursing students have a moderate level of spiritual well-being, measures should be taken to improve it during their studies. Because improving SWB in students will prepare future nurses for better quality care of dying patients and enhance their positive attitude toward death.

Periods of transition are often symbolically associated with death, making the latter the paradigm of liminality. Yet, many volumes on death in the social sciences and humanities do not specifically address liminality. This book investigates these \"ultimate ambiguities,\" assuming they can pose a threat to social relationships because of the disintegrating forces of death, but they are also crucial periods of creativity, change, and emergent aspects of social and religious life. Contributors explore death and liminality from an interdisciplinary perspective and present a global range of historical and contemporary case studies outlining emotional, cognitive, artistic, social, and political implications.

Background Medical end-of-life decisions, including voluntary active euthanasia (lethal injection), (physician-)assisted dying (prescribing lethal substances), passive euthanasia (refraining from or ceasing life-sustaining treatments), palliative sedation (administering sedatives to alleviate suffering, possibly leading to unintended life-shortening), and treatment withdrawal/withholding, have become prevalent in modern medical practice. Aim This systematic review aims to analyse international data on undergraduate medical students' attitudes towards (physician-) assisted dying, palliative sedation, treatment withdrawal/withholding, active and passive euthanasia. The objectives are to assess approval rates over the past 24 years and to identify factors influencing these attitudes. Design In accordance with PRISMA guidelines, a systematic search of six electronic databases (MEDLINE, CINAHL, EMBASE, ERIC, PsycINFO, and Web of Science) was conducted. The review encompasses studies from 2000–2024. Results Forty-nine studies met the inclusion criteria (43 surveys, 6 qualitative studies, 1 mixed-method study). The studies were globally distributed: Europe (27), Asia (10), America (8), Africa (3), and Australia (1). Predictors such as age, clinical vs. pre-clinical status, religious aspects, sex, and ethnicity were investigated. Age and gender had limited influence, whereas religion was a significant factor. Compared with pre-clinical students, clinical students showed more support for end-of-life practices. Geographic locations and socioeconomic status also affect attitudes. Conclusion Medical students’ attitudes towards end-of-life decisions are influenced by clinical experience, religious beliefs, and geographic location. The acceptance rates for euthanasia and (physician-)assisted dying vary significantly across regions, reflecting diverse cultural and educational backgrounds.

Background Making appropriate end-of-life decisions in the intensive care unit (ICU) requires shared interprofessional decision-making. Thus, a decision-making climate that values the contributions of all team members, addresses diverse opinions and seeks consensus among team members is necessary. Little is known about religion’s influence on ethical decision-making climates. Therefore, this study aimed to examine the association between religious belief and ethical decision-making climates. Methods The study was a cross-sectional analytical observation study as a part of the prospective observational DISPROPRICUS study. A total of 2,275 nurses and 717 physicians from 68 ICUs representing 12 countries in Europe and the US participated. All participants were asked which religion (if any) they belonged to and how important their religion (if any) was for their professional attitude towards end-of-life care. Perceptions of ethical decision-making climates were evaluated using a validated, 35-item self-assessment questionnaire that evaluates seven factors. Using cluster analysis, ICUs were categorised into four ethical decision-making climates: good, average (with nurses’ involvement at the end of life), average (without nurses’ involvement at the end of life) and poor. Results Of the 2,992 participants, 453 (15%) were religious (had religious convictions and found them important or very important for their attitude towards end-of-life care). The remaining 2,539 were non-religious (i.e. had religious convictions but assessed that they were not important for their attitude towards end-of-life care). When adjusting for country and ICU, the overall perception of the four ethical climates was associated with religious beliefs, with non-religious healthcare providers having more positive perceptions of the ethical climates compared to religious healthcare providers ( p  < 0.01). Within good climates, non-religious healthcare providers rated leadership by physicians ( p  < 0.01), interdisciplinary reflection ( p   =  0.049) and active decision-making by physicians ( p   =  0.02) as more positive compared to religious participants. In poor climates, religious healthcare providers had a more positive perception of the active involvement of nurses ( p  = 0.01). Within the other climates, no differences were found. Conclusions Overall perceptions of ethical decision-making climates were associated with religious beliefs, with non-religious healthcare providers generally having a more positive perception of the ethical climates than religious healthcare providers.