Grief and Critical Care Nursing: Occurrence and Resolution

This article reports on research designed to assess the level of grief and the mechanisms of resolution experienced by critical care nurses as they relate to patient death. This prospective exploratory, descriptive study surveyed Registered Nurses (N=92) assigned to Critical Care Units at the University of Colorado Hospital in Denver, Colorado. Based on the findings, the author offers suggestions for ways to provide grief management education to staff as well as timely grief ministry by chaplains.

A Family Observed: Theological and Family Systems Perspectives on the Grief Experience

Explores the grief experience in a family case study and proposes an integrative model of pastoral grief ministry in which personal grief reactions are attended to within the family context. Utilizes developmental/systemic perspectives to correlate the family grief experience with the process of family grief ministry, focusing especially on the pastoral task of facilitating the family in constructing a healing theory.