PURPOSE: To understand the lived experience of mothers surrounding the time of being informed of neonatal deaths in intensive care units. DESIGN: A phenomenological qualitative approach was employed. METHODS: Twelve mothers (age 24-41 years) were…
This study aimed to explore grandparents' experiences of grief after the death of a grandchild, their perception of socially supportive behavior as well as their satisfaction with a bereavement support care. A six-session bereavement support group…
CONTEXT: Healthcare providers and parents face many challenges caring for infants at the end of life (EOL). Symptom assessment and management in critically ill infants can be especially difficult. However, the impact of the infant's EOL experience on…
BACKGROUND: Families who learn that their unborn baby has a life-limiting fetal condition are often overwhelmed by this news, alongside navigating an unfamiliar healthcare system. A skilled perinatal palliative care coordinator (PPCC) can help these…
To enhance understanding of parental relationships following the loss of a child, a questionnaire was sent to members of Norwegian bereavement support organizations. The sample consisted of 175 couples. Using the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS), we…
This study explored bereaved mothers' responses to the death of a child from cancer, with a focus on identifying adaptive and complicated grief reactions. To understand the unique meaning of their loss, in-depth interviews were conducted with 13…
Pediatric Intensive Care Units (PICUs) provide multidisciplinary care to critically ill children and their families. Grief is present throughout the trajectory of illness and can peak around the time of death or non-death losses. The objective of…
BACKGROUND: The death of a child is acutely distressing. Evidence on the benefits and value to parents of spending time with their dead child have now been integrated into routine practice and is regarded as a bereavement support intervention. UK…
BACKGROUND: Evidence on the benefits to parents of spending time with their child in the hours after their death means this is now routine practice. UK children's hospices offer parents the opportunity to extend this period by using cooling…
Bereaved parenting, a role that entails parenting surviving children after experiencing the death of a child, is a unique but understudied phenomenon within bereavement research. Not much is known about the impact of a child's death on this crucial…
CONTEXT: The death of a child from cancer is a devastating event, placing bereaved parents at risk for both physical and psychosocial morbidities. Despite growing awareness of these outcomes and increased hospital-based support, bereaved parents…
Given the massive influences of COVID-19 restrictions on people in nearly all nations, we conducted an in-depth qualitative study of 15 Belgian parents who had lost a child prior to the pandemic in order to understand its impact on their ongoing…
BACKGROUND: Although perinatal deaths are still a common pregnancy outcome in developing countries, little is known about the effect perinatal death has on fathers. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to understand and describe the meaning of…
A child's death is a traumatic life experience for parents. Health-care professionals (HCPs) have sought guidance on how to intervene with grieving parents, particularly with fathers. Having therapeutic conversations is an effective way for HCPs to…
Owing to differences in opinion about patient autonomy and perceived maturity, discussing diagnosis and prognosis with children can be challenging. Shifting away from “never tell” and “always tell” approaches, recent articles have championed more…
BACKGROUND: Nurses who work with very unwell or dying children may experience intense sorrow and distress in response to loss, which can take an emotional toll on them, potentially affecting care provision. AIM: This study aimed to explore the…
Historically, men’s experiences of grief following pregnancy loss and neonatal death have been under-explored in comparison to women. However, investigating men’s perspectives is important, given potential gendered differences concerning grief…
Perinatal loss is a major life crisis involving multiple losses, including the loss of future hopes and dreams, of being pregnant, and of self-esteem, to name a few. In the present study I focus on mothers who experienced perinatal loss and chose to…
Purpose Research shows that knowledge about mental health status, both protective and risk factors, is limited in cancer-bereaved parents. The study aimed to investigate (1) the extent of psychological distress in bereaved parents 2–8 years after the…
Grief support changes as more is learned from current grief theory and research. The authors provide a comprehensive overview of current grief support as it relates to Pediatric Palliative Care (PPC). The following aspects of grief are addressed: (1)…
Background: Death of any of siblings is an overwhelming, severe, and prolonged challenge in children development process and is a major risk factor for psychiatric disorders in childhood and later. Interventions for bereaved families following a…
Communication and interaction with healthcare workers at the time of stillbirth remain in parents' long-term memories and impact on emotional and psychological well-being. Cultural attitudes and norms influence how stillbirth is acknowledged and…
OBJECTIVES: This systematic review aims to assess the effectiveness of bereavement support interventions (BSIs) for parents of an infant or a child who has died from a medical condition or in unforeseen circumstances. METHODS: A systematic search of…
Understanding parents' experience of care is essential to develop high-quality perinatal bereavement services. This study aimed at developing a questionnaire to identify parents' needs and record their experience of care. The patient experience…
The death of a child is an individual process of grief but also a context of significant relational processes, which have been only rarely considered in research. The aim of this study was to examine the interactive processes within bereaved parents.…
This article describes one nurse's experience resulting from her interest in the value of giving bereavement photographs to parents who experience a perinatal loss. Three families were interviewed about the meaning of those photographs. The parents…
PURPOSE: To explore fathers' experiences of pregnancy after a prior perinatal loss. STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: This phenomenological study used unstructured, in-depth interviews with four men whose wives were currently pregnant subsequent to previous…
Objective To explore end-of-life (EoL) decision-making and palliative care in hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy (HIE) nationwide. Methods A cross-sectional national study on moderate-to-severe HIE in newborns ≥35 weeks’ gestational age in 2015,…
BACKGROUND: Children's books have the potential to facilitate communication about death for children living with a serious illness and for children coping with the death of a loved one. OBJECTIVES: This study examines the content of children's…
Background Memory making is the process of creating mementos of a child with a life-limiting condition, who may be at or near end of life, providing a tangible and visual connection to the child who has died. Acorns memory making work already…
This study reports the effects of sibling death on 33 adolescents from white, middle- to upper-middle income families. Contact was made through mutual support groups for bereaved parents. A focused interview was used to gather data on bereavement…
OBJECTIVE: To explore the influence of the Amulet artwork and exhibition on midwifery students' perceptions of caring for parents experiencing perinatal death. DESIGN: A descriptive qualitative design involving face-to-face semi-structured interviews…
A review of the literature provides the basis for a discussion of the impact of sibling death on healthy children whose emotional needs may be unattended both by parents and professionals. Factors which may deter hospice practitioners from delivering…
Aim: The role of parents in decision-making concerning their child's end-of-life care is not clearly defined. Their participation is encouraged by ethical reflection, in particular by the CCNE (French National Ethics Advisory Committee), but laws are…
Background: Last Aid Courses (LAC) for adults have been established in 21 countries in Europe, Australia and America to improve the public discussion about death and dying and to empower people to participate in end-of-life care provision. In 2018,…
Many people are exposed to loss or potentially traumatic events at some point in their lives, and yet they continue to have positive emotional experiences and show only minor and transient disruptions in their ability to function. Unfortunately,…
For nearly a century, bereavement theorists have assumed that recovery from loss requires a period of grief work in which the ultimate goal is the severing of the attachment bond to the deceased. Reviews appearing in the 1980s noted a surprising…
