{"id":1036,"date":"2015-05-20T07:17:52","date_gmt":"2015-05-20T06:17:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/?p=1036"},"modified":"2015-05-24T07:02:11","modified_gmt":"2015-05-24T06:02:11","slug":"a-good-death-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/?p=1036","title":{"rendered":"Read :A Good Death ?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alex James Shares her thoughts\u00a0<\/span><\/h1>\n

A Good Death<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0This week Tania and I chatted about a good death. It seems very topical at the moment with news items about death without dignity and families being denied opportunities to discuss endings with their loved ones through lack of information.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0In this blog I\u2019d like to share some of my own experiences of death with you and hopefully provoke some thoughts about good death not only for those you love but for yourself.\u00a0 In the conversation with Tania I shared with you the story of my brother Simon who, I had had some involvement with towards the end of his life. Simon and I had not grown up together but our relationship rekindled after my father\u2019s death and when Simon was dying of Aids. I talked about my own perception of how I believed a good death would be for Simon \u2013 all tucked up in a nice clean hospital bed with a few chosen loved ones by his side. I\u2019m sharing this because I think it\u2019s important that we don\u2019t get a good death and our own interpretations of a good death and our assumptions for others confused. Basically, a good death, I believe, should be as far as is possible pain free and wherever possible in the chosen place of the dying individual. In spite of all of my knowledge and attempts to help him my father died alone in a hospital bed in a confused state. Until his death , I spent every day with him, my son and I lifting him and changing his bedding as there was not enough staff to care for him. In the bed opposite my father a man cried out every few minutes in pain, asking for water and a pee but no one came \u2026 they responded with \u2026 just coming Mr X or wait a minute we are busy. I\u2019m not blaming them there was only two staff for 16 elderly patients. His food was placed by his bedside, he couldn\u2019t reach it. It was heart breaking to watch and at first I tried to focus only on my father ,but finding it too distressing to do nothing my son and I gave the man small sips of water and in the end I complained that he needed a pee and was wet, which eventually provoked some attention to his needs. My father messed several times and my son and I changed him, bathed him and we managed to get some cream for his sore bottom. It wasn\u2019t dignified for him but better than lying in his own wet urine. We felt helpless, my son and I tried hard to make his last days comfortable as we could. We both felt like we were being a nuisance as we asked staff for clean sheets and bathing equipment \u2013what if we hadn\u2019t been there? It was a blessing that he was confused, he\u2019d have hated to die like that. In the hospice where I worked it was a completely different story, patients tended to with dignity, time given to accompany the lonely, holding their hands, ensuring families got support too. Pain managed as far as was possible and people receiving genuine compassionate care at a time when they were afraid or lonely.\u00a0 I don\u2019t understand why the way we receive care at the end of life is such a lottery. \u00a0The thought of dying alone and in pain drenched in my own urine or excrement and desperate for a sip of water scares me. We must try to instigate changes, for everyone\u2019s sake none of us is immortal. \u00a0Why is it that so little attention seems to be given to end of life care in our hospitals? Why are there so few staff? \u00a0I think we need to really look at this \u2013 like everything it begins with communication. I sincerely hope the press attention will open a forum for discussion \u00a0and that if your thoughts about your own wishes for end of life care have been provoked share them \u2013 let\u2019s talk !!<\/em><\/p>\n

Alex<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Alex James Shares her thoughts\u00a0 A Good Death \u00a0This week Tania and I chatted about a good death. It seems very topical at the moment with news items about death without dignity and families being denied opportunities to discuss endings with their loved ones through lack of information. \u00a0In this blog I\u2019d like to share […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1036"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1036"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1036\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1047,"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1036\/revisions\/1047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bereavement.co.uk\/Media-Centre\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}