Abstract
Death is present in the daily lives of hospital professionals, a daily, invasive, and limitless companion, which they tirelessly seek to control and cure. People experience different feelings and emotions not knowing which way to go and what to do in the face of the complexity of this topic. This field research, qualitative and descriptive, aimed to understand how residents perceive the death. Thus, 18 residents of the multidisciplinary and medical team of a university hospital responded to a structured interview, and we analyzed their opinions with the help of Bardin’s content analysis. The data obtained resulted in 4 categories, with category 2 having 3 subcategories. In general, residents perceived their participation as an opportunity to speak, to express feelings and emotions about the topic. The participants understand death as the end of life, a moment of uncertainty, fear, and anguish, awakening different perceptions and feelings of helplessness, and perceive the theme as an opportunity for reflection on the concept of dignified death. We observed a need to include the study of Thanatology in the curricula of health courses and highlight that the understanding of the death of oneself and the other is scarcely explored in the literature. We emphasize the importance of this study for the increase of productions on Education for Death and Dying, for Psychology and Thanatology, and for the improvement of residency programs.
Keywords:
Thanatology; Residents; University hospital; Death; Qualitative research