Facing Death, Patients, Families and Professionals

This course offers a detailed insight into the needs of patients facing death, as well as their families and the professionals providing their care. Throughout the course are threaded the 6 Cs: care, compassion, competence, communication, courage and commitment.

You’ll consider loss and bereavement, examine the challenges faced by families (including children), and explore the dynamics of the patient/family relationship network. You’ll look at the impact of loss on patients, families and professional carers, and link this to counselling theory and communication skills. You’ll learn about diversity in palliative and end of life care, as well as the ethical, psychological and spiritual frameworks.

The recent publications ‘One Chance to Get it Right’ (Leadership Alliance for the Care of Dying People, 2014) based on the five new priorities for care will inform the course content.

Course Content

• How psychological, socio-cultural and spiritual features impact on care
• Critical reflection of practice
• Ethics and values
• Underpinning theory and its application to practice
• Effective communication

Achieve an award

You can take this module as part of our BSc (Hons) Palliative & End of Life Care (top-up) course.