Caring for Elderly

In terms of hospice, one’s perception about death is a crucial factor as well. Death is the last milestone for everyone. This is an inevitable and natural process within the development cycle. Some research results have indicated that older people are less afraid of death than younger people. However, there are many variables that can influence how an elderly person would perceive about this issue.

For example, one’s poor physical and mental condition, being widowed, or being institutionalized seem to reduce one’s fear of death. In addition, elderly people may accept death more easily because they have been able to live long. Second, experiencing the deaths of others more frequently, they may have accepted their own death as a natural process. Furthermore, at this stage of their life span, they may perceive their lives as less value than those of the younger people. Hence, they may not strenuously to giving up their lives. All these factors may contribute to the reason that elderly people are less anxious about death.

On the contrary, some studies have indicated that those who feel in control of their own lives and who are both physically and mentally healthy are more anxious about death in comparison. This result may indicate that as long as one still has the ability and strength, he/she has the will to live. From the Erikson’s psychosocial development theory perspective, those who perceive their lives as a successful endeavor will produce a sense of integrity at their late adulthood, whereas those who perceive their lives with disappointment and purposeless will approach death with regrets and fear.

In terms of cultural differences about the issue of death and dying, some have commented that different cultural groups may share attitudes toward death or they may have quite distinct attitudes as part of their own unique death systems. For example, in Chinese culture, talking about death should be avoided because the Chinese culture believes that talking about this issue will bring bad things to happen. Asking a Chinese elderly to talk about his/her living wills is not widely promoted in the traditional Chinese culture as well. Although evidence is found to indicate that individual who talks about his or her loss will less likely to develop depressive and somatic symptoms and will have better health than those who do not talk about the issues, this relationship is correlated and not necessarily an indication that talking about grief will reduce depressive symptomatology. Thus, there is no single avenue for dealing with the issue of death and dying. Cultural differences should be taken into account for understanding how the elderly will deal with this issue. For example, in the Chinese culture instead of encouraging an individual to express his/her feelings about death verbally, an elderly may prefer an non-verbal approach. Someone being able to show his/her willingness to support and readiness to listen when the elderly is ready to talk about his/her feelings will be more appropriate in the Chinese culture. Thus, death perception is a crucial factor when we are talking about hospice.