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PERSPECTIVE article

Front. Med.
Sec. Family Medicine and Primary Care
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2024.1489299
This article is part of the Research Topic Palliative and End of Life Care in the Post-Pandemic Era: Old Problems and New Perspectives View all 3 articles

Compassionate engagement of communities in support of Palliative and End-of-life care: challenges in post-pandemic era

Provisionally accepted
Joel Vieira Joel Vieira 1,2Beatriz Duarte Beatriz Duarte 2Amira M. Ali Amira M. Ali 3Carlos Laranjeira Carlos Laranjeira 1,4,5*
  • 1 School of Health Sciences, Polytechnic Institute of Leiria, Leiria, Portugal
  • 2 Palliative Care Unit, Portuguese Institute of Oncology of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal
  • 3 Department of Psychiatric Nursing and Mental Health, Faculty of Nursing, Alexandria University, Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt
  • 4 Center for Innovative Care and Health Technology, Polytechnic Institute of Leiria, Leiria, Leiria, Portugal
  • 5 Comprehensive Health Research Centre, University of Evora, Évora, Portugal

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Over the years, humanity has faced various global crises of different kinds that have caused great suffering in the community, such as wars, slavery, torture or the Holocaust, but also climate change, economic crises, or sanitary disasters. The recent pandemic posed a barrier to palliative and End-of-Life (EoL) care, as the need for physical distance made it difficult to retain essential human interactions while minimizing the risk of viral transmission. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the robustness of supportive networks (i.e., family, friends, neighbours, and community members) determined whether someone experienced a calm death at home or an unnecessary hospital admission, labelled as an 'emergency'. In this vein, active establishment and strengthening of such networks are the foundation of compassionate community efforts. Firstly, providing both physical and emotional support to the entire network of caregivers enhances their ability to care for others and improves the overall experience of death, including the process of dying and the ensuing bereavement period. Furthermore, individuals can enhance their own physical and mental health by practising compassion. The ability of networks to withstand and recover from physical and emotional challenges, while maintaining strong and supportive relationships among its members, depends on the health and overall well-being of those members. Therefore, we argue that active community participation and death education can strengthen a community's capacity to assist people facing death, dying, and bereavement.

    Keywords: Compassionate communities, Death literacy, Palliative Care, Post-pandemic era, Advance Care Planning, Psychosocial support

    Received: 31 Aug 2024; Accepted: 09 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Vieira, Duarte, Ali and Laranjeira. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Carlos Laranjeira, School of Health Sciences, Polytechnic Institute of Leiria, Leiria, Portugal

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.