Death Education and Physicians' Attitudes toward Dying Patients

Abstract

The literature suggests that physicians have difficulty relating to dying patients. Medical schools traditionally have not addressed themselves to this issue. The object of this research was to determine if physicians' reported attitudes toward dying patients were related to the amount of death education physicians received. A 71 per cent return rate was received from a questionnaire mailed to 1540 graduates (classes of 1972–1975) from five selected medical schools. Twenty per cent of the physicians had taken an entire course in medical school on relating to dying patients. Physicians with formal coursework tended to relate somewhat differently to the dying patient than did physicians who did not take such a course as four of the eleven Likert-type statements on relating to dying patients revealed a statistically significant relationship–using a Chi-square test–between those who had a course on dealing with dying patients and those with less than a course. It is suggested that this difference might also be attributed to a self-selection of students choosing to take such a course.