Term | Definition |
Advanced directives | Legal documents providing specific instructions for health care treatment in the event a person is unable to make decisions at the time they are needed. |
The Patient Self Determination Act | requires health care institutions to inquire whether a patient has created an Advanced Directive |
Anticipatory grief | To prepare oneself for the loss of a family member or loved one |
Autopsy | Postmortem examination performed to determine the cause of death |
Bereavement | Common depressed reaction to the death of a loved one |
Death | Cessation of life |
Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) | A written doctor's order that no cardio-resuscitation will be performed for a patient. A joint decision involving the patient, family and doctor |
If there is not a DNR order | a code must be called if the patient arrests |
DNR orders do not mean | withhold any other health care |
Durable Power of Attorney | A legal document that must be notarized and that gives one or more individuals the right to make decisions on behalf of the person |
Dysfunctional grieving | Unresolved grief or complicated mourning |
Euthanasia | An action taken deliberately with the purposes of shortening life to end suffering or to carry out the wishes of the terminally ill |
Passive euthanasia | Treatments withheld that may have extended the patient's life but result in death |
Grief | A pattern of physical and emotional responses to bereavement, separation or loss |
Grief therapy | Mental treatment aimed at helping a patient deal with the pain of loss; a program to assist the bereaved to cope with their loss |
Grief work | Adaptation process of mourning a loss |
Living Will | Legal document that describes in detail what medical care a person wants if they become terminally ill |
Loss | To no longer possess or have an object, person, or situation |
Maturational loss | Loss resulting from normal life transitions |
Morbidity | Illness or abnormal condition or quality |
Mortality | Condition of being subject to death |
Mortician | Person trained in the care of the dead |
Mourning | Reaction activated by a person to assist in overcoming a great personal loss |
Post mortem care | Care for patient's body after death |
Situational loss | Loss occurring suddenly in response to a specific external event |
Thanatologist | Person who studies death and dying |
Thanatology | Study of death and dying |
Hospice care | Hospice is a philosophy of care that provides support to patients with a terminal illness and their families |
Palliative care | Therapy that is not curative in nature but designed to relieve pain and distress and control symptoms of the disease |
Palliative care provides nursing interventions for the following | Basic needs and ADLs.
Pain and symptom management.
Spiritual and psychological support for the patient, family and significant
others. |