Relationships Between Nurses Attitudes Toward Death and Their Communication Comfort about End-of-Life Issues

Abstract

Background Nurses’ belief systems (cultural, social and philosophical) may influence their attitudes towards death. Nurses’ attitudes towards death may in turn effect the care they provide the dying (Peters et al., 2013; Sherwen, 2014). In other words, care of the dying may depend on the nurses’ feelings and ideas about death and dying, their religious convictions, and their philosophies of death and life (Billings, Engelberg, Curtis, Block, & Sullivan, 2010; Ferrell, Virani, Grant, Coyne, & Uman, 2000). Aim This study was conducted to establish if there is a relationship between nurses’ attitudes toward death and their communication comfort about end of life issues. Methods A link to the web-based questionnaire was made available to the nurses to complete over a 12 week period. The response rate was 19.9% (n=225). The questionnaire consisted of the following: demographic questions, the Intercultural Palliative Care Communication Comfort (IPCCC), the Spirituality and Spiritual Care Rating Scale (SSCR), the Spiritual Health and Life Orientation Measure (SHALOM), and the Death Attitude Profile-Revised (DAP-R). Data analyses included t-test and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). Results The nurse respondents’ characteristics such as religion, age, ethnicity, education, and spoken language were significantly related to attitudes towards death. The nurses’ education and spoken language were significantly related to comfort with end of life communication. Nurses’ spirituality was significantly related to attitudes towards death. The nurses’ spirituality was not significantly related to end-of-life communication comfort. Conclusion There is evidence of a relationship between nurses’ attitudes toward death and their end of life communication comfort. Further research is required examining the role of a nurses’ ethnicity and the religiosity of the nurse in end of life communication comfort.