Palliative care nurses: virtuous or vulnerable?

Palliative Care nurses are subjected to a gamut of emotional, legal and highly sensitive issues on a daily basis working within the field of palliation. Being able to cope with often complex family dynamics at a time of intense emotional stress, plus trying to be nurse and comforter to patients’ distressing symptoms and prognosis, leaves many nurses exhausted and burnt out.

This presentation looks at the danger of believing so completely in the concept that palliative nurses are special or any different to any other nurse in a different area of nursing, suggesting that this belief in being someone so special can mean that professional boundaries may be crossed, potentially creating an extremely vulnerable nurse.