Death of an Institutionalized Parent: Predictors of Bereavement

Abstract

A multidimensional analysis of bereavement experienced by eighty-four adult children whose parents died following a stay in a long term care facility indicated that pre-death indicators of strain (length of stay, parent's cognitive status, child's feelings about parent living in a nursing home, depression) had varying levels of predictive power regarding the extent to which the child reported feeling sad, experiencing persistent thoughts about the parent, feeling a sense of comfort in memories about the parent, feeling that the parent was a buffer to the child's mortality, and having a sense of relief.

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