Facing the challenge in undergraduate nursing curricula: Educating nurses to care for the person dying and their family

Most nurses generally perceive the nursing practices related to caring for the person dying and their family to be a core component of all nurses' work, regardless of the setting. The complexity and stresses associated with caring for a person dying and their family are well acknowledged in the literature. Yet for many nurses, they voice that it continues to be one of the highest sources of stress in their work. Nurses feel in part, their lack of educational preparation plays a contributory role to this stress.

Minimal research has been conducted internationally and in Australia, to determine the exact nature of what educational preparation is required by undergraduate nursing students to adequately prepare them for this role. This paper reports on the first phase of a study exploring the initial experiences by nurses when caring for a person dying and their family, during their undergraduate nursing education. The exploration of the initial experience by story telling sees the emergence of a number of themes that have led to a greater understanding and meaning of the experience. In addition, a survey of Australian Bachelor of Nursing curricula was conducted and is also reported on to further illuminate this issue and confirm the inadequacy of undergraduate nurses educational preparation.

Implications for this study are focussed on the educational preparation needs of nursing students; the means by which 'we' can promote their well being and safety in the learning environment and the nature of supportive mechanisms by the nurse in making sense of the experience.

The provision of palliative care education in undergraduate nursing curricula continues to be inadequately addressed and may fail to prepare nurses for the issues they confront when required to provide palliative care, in the generalist setting. Therefore, this curriculum issue continues to be a significant challenge for educators of nurses and must remain a high priority in curricula debate in order to seek the optimal educational preparation for the nurses of the future.