Hospice Bereavement Professionals Rise to the Challenge

One of the many impacts of the COVID-19 health care crisis has manifested itself in the form of complicated grief. Families are being robbed of the ability to see their loved ones who may be dying in a health care facility or are unable to mourn together because funerals and memorial services are limited in capacity. Front line health care workers are witnessing some of the most tragic events of their careers. The lasting impact of COVID-19 will stretch beyond the physical and leave deep emotional wounds that will need healing. 

Hospice bereavement professionals across the country are answering the call to provide grief support in their local communities and for front line health care workers. Patti Anewalt, PhD, LPC, FT, Director of the Pathways Center for Grief & Loss at Hospice & Community Care in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, shares her experience in providing support beyond the families her organization has cared for.

The National Association of School Psychologists are encouraging School Administrators and Crisis Teams to “be prepared and get ready” to respond to deaths within school communities that will impact teachers, staff, students and families. As a result, I was contacted to provide a two-hour training for school nurses, psychologists, counselors and administrators. Over 100 people attended and asked numerous questions. I explained that people can grieve (ie react to a loss) but not mourn. Adults, children and teens need to feel safe to mourn. Mourning is the way people express their grief reactions and there is healthy as well as unhealthy mourning. Knowing the incidence of suicide and drug overdoses are increasing at this time I addressed the important nuances to understand these types of losses. Often adults are not honest with children about the cause of death which serves to further complicate their grief. 

After talking about ways to support people’s mourning, I shared slides on how to provide individual or group support via Zoom along with three sample Zoom sessions that we have used with grieving children. By the conclusion of the session people expressed appreciation for the information, as they felt more knowledgeable and confident about how to respond to and support grieving students and their parents going forward. 

A second area we are beginning to see great need for bereavement support is with health care workers. Not only our own hospice teams, who are providing care to dying patients in environments quite different now that PPE and physical distancing is involved, but all the long-term care providers. Next week I will be offering four separate sessions at change of shift on two different days to accommodate the volume of staff at a local senior living facility. Many of their residents who have died have been at the facility for years and their deaths are having an impact on the staff who do their best to create a home-like atmosphere.

Over the years skilled care facilities have at times asked us to facilitate these types of sessions for their staff when residents die so it’s not surprising that we in bereavement are now being asked to provide this support which we now do virtually. They are struggling with the heaviness of the burden to care for patients at a time when they must use social distancing as much as possible, PPE, and serve as the link between the residents and their family members who are not able to visit. I keep describing this as a marathon, not a sprint. I believe one of the greatest concerns for administrators is the long-haul nature this crisis will have on their caregivers. 

If your program is offering grief support to your local community, front line health care workers, first responders or anyone impacted by COVID-19, please share your story with us. You can also submit your photos and stories to NHPCO’s #hapcFacesOfCaring campaign. This social media campaign was designed for hospice and palliative care workers to share their experience from the front lines amid COVID-19.