Supervision in the helping professions a practical approach

Abstract

This article is based on an ethnographic study undertaken to explore whether eight people diagnosed with terminal cancer and their families drew on aspects of their cultural identities to make sense of their journey towards death, and if so, how. Ethnographic methods were supplemented by semistructured interviews. Most participants received medical treatments until close to death and invested much effort, time, and hope in these. Consequently, they made little sense of their palliative referrals. Instead, they accommodated the biomedical cultures of treatment-oriented services, thus delaying their own and their family's preparation for death. Only three participants appeared well prepared one month prior to death. An ecological perspective helped to explain the systemic factors involved in this prioritisation. The authors make recommendations for greater involvement of social workers in palliative care, and for more attention to supporting dying people and their families to make culturally meaningful decisions in the journey toward death.