“Good” Death During the Pandemic

“Surrounded by family” is a phrase often used to depict the concept of a “good” death. To die among loved ones is something we desire for ourselves and practitioners want for their patients. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed everything. “It’s hard enough to wrap your brain around death, but this is even more difficult when people have to die alone — without loved ones or even caregivers or other team members at their bedside. That, as much as anything, is making this pandemic about traumatic grief and loss,” said Carla Cheatham, MA, MDiv, PhD, TRT, author of Hospice Whispers: Stories of Life (SCIE, 2015).