LOGO
Beaumont Hospital Palliative Care
Study Day
Grief and the Healthcare worker
Pauline King
Staff Counsellor
Beaumont Hospital

“ No matter what we might do to make it easier, death remains the ultimate separation, the ultimate unknown”

 Compassion Fatigue.
 Vicarious trauma.
 Burnout.

 Multiple losses.
 Attachments.
 Workload.
 Lack of Institutional support.
 Interprofessional conflict.
 Expectations

 Personal
 Self Awareness
 Mentor
 Support system
 Spiritual/Meditative practice
 Team
 Healthy working relationships.
 Formal supports
(MDTM)
 Rituals.

 “ Detached concern” (Lief & Fox 1963)
 Research by Dania Papadatou 2000.

Identified the difference between “burnout” and “grief”
 Health care professionals do grieve and a healthy fluctuation between experiencing and avoiding feelings of grief occurs.
 This fluctuation is necessary, adaptive and healthy.

Experiencing
Grief
“Life Style”
Idiosyncratic beliefs values assumptions about self, others, life.
Personal Loss-history
Meaning making &
Loss transcendence
Avoiding
Or repressing
Grief
“Work Style”
Unit’s goals, values assumptions about care in
Illness, dying, death
Rules regarding professional conduct.

Nature of losses:
 Unique bond.
 Sympathetic grief.
 Goals and expectations.
 Beliefs & assumptions.
 Restimulation of personal loss.
 Mortality.

.
 Moving away.
 Psychic numbing.
 Avoidance.
 Practical tasks.
 Dehumanisation.

 Step out of automatic pilot.
 Create a gap between reactivity and response.
 Develop capacity for:
 Curiosity
 Openness
 Acceptance
 Loving Kindness

This being human is a guest-house
Every morning a new arrival
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
Some momentary awareness comes
As an unexpected visitor
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
Who violently sweep your house
Empty of its furniture.
Still treat each guest honourably.
He may be clearing you out for some new delight
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
Meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent
As a guide from beyond.