These tend to be models of care that emphasize disease, pathology and wellness. These are paradigms that are curative in their pursuits. Tutored by these frameworks, the dying often believe they have neither social significance nor human value. This section will examine the impact of medical phenomenology on both our care and our perceptions of the dying. Attention will be given to the application of grief and bereavement theory to the dying and its implications to our contemporary care of the dying.
Few families are prepared for what they encounter.
This module will describe the partnership and partisanship politics of the death awareness movement, and the legal, moral and human paradigms of end of life care as well as their impact on our service delivery models. Students will learn to identify variables that impact on grief and bereavement . How someone dies will have an impact on her family and the significant others who make up his or her community. Too often health science's emphasis is on a disease or the person living with the disease rather than the bereaved survivors. As people live longer with life threatening illness, their end of life care falls to their family caregivers.