This application seeks support to explore the experiences of dying cancer patients. While over the past few decades considerable progress has been made in caring for the dying, recent research suggests that many dying patients continue to be denied what they would consider to be a good death. That is, their experience has not coincided with their idea of what the end of life should be. This qualitative study is aimed in gaining knowledge that will increase the chances that dying-for patients with cancer and their families-will be as good an experience as possible. During this three-year study, data will be gathered on approximately 30-40 dying patients. The informants will be identified through a hospice program that has agreed to participate in the study. Data will be gathered in the informants homes and communities through interviews with the patients and their family caregivers. After the patients have died, their family caregivers and the primary hospice nurse (RN) responsible for this care will be interviewed again to elicit their descriptions and assessments of the patients deaths. Data collected in the forms of field notes and transcribed interviews will then be treated as texts that will be subjected to a hermeneutical/ phenomenological analysis. In a multi-step process of interpretation and categorization of data, the texts will be examined in detail and the most significant or exemplary data will be identified and organized into themes that characterize what dying well, often referred to in the literature as the good death , means from the perspective of these informants. The results of this study will lead to plans for specific interventions at the level of patient and family assessment and care, professional education, and health care policy.
