Bereavement and End of Life care during the Covid-19 pandemic

In this episode of Covid Matters we talk to Dr Emily Harrop, a Marie Curie Research Fellow at Cardiff University who specialises in palliative care. She is currently working as the Co-Principal Investigator in the national ‘Bereavement During Covid-19’ study, looking into people’s experiences of bereavement and the support services they have access to during the coronavirus pandemic. We spoke to Emily to find out more about this study and the findings so far.

At the time of recording, Emily was beginning to analyse the first round of responses from the 7 month survey. She explains that a particular challenge in their method of study is that the situation is ongoing, and restrictions are changeable. She said, “it's strange, because you have to also take into account the changing context. Some people’s loved ones will have died in full lockdown, others have experienced death during a period where things had opened-up again. So, we’ve had to take that into account when looking at the results and analysis.”

Emily also reminds us of the sad reality of the situation when looking at the statistics – that no one in this study ends up better off. “It's been a terrible time for everyone so I don't want to try and make out that it's been better for some groups than others. The overriding message is that it's been such a tough time for all people who've lost family members during the pandemic.”

You can find out more about the Bereavement During Covid-19 study here.

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Music by Asepirawan20 from Pixabay

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