Only when we recognize and really understand that we have limited time on Earth and that we have no way of knowing when it will end, will we begin to live to the fullest every day, as if it were the only one we have. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross
E lisabeth Kübler-Ross was a psychiatrist and pioneer in the study of death. She is the author of the book On Death and Dying in 1969, in which she presented what is known as the Kübler-Ross model. In it, he proposes 5 stages of grief when an individual learns that he will die . These 5 stages are denial, anger, negotiation, depression and acceptance . They also apply to survivors of the death of a loved one.
From this book, which already became a classic, death ceased to be a taboo subject . Previously, patients died alone in hospitals, doctors ignored them and medication was not used correctly to alleviate pain . This book brought those practices to the foreground and pressed for the dying to receive a more humane treatment.
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross based her work on her understanding, since her first years of life, that death, like birth, is a normal part of the life cycle .
Death, like birth, is a normal part of the life cycle.
In their native Switzerland, people died in their homes, surrounded by family and friends, where they remained comfortable and content until the end of their lives.
In contrast, in the United States and in other countries where they prioritized technical advances in medicine, patients were neglected. Elisabeth deplored that practice.
His pre-book research was based on interviewing terminal patients at the University of Chicago hospital, where he was a psychiatrist. From here emerged the five stages or the "common denominator" of death and the dying. The model outlines how the terminal patients approach their diagnosis and the emotions that arise until the acceptance of the impending death.
Questions and answers about Death and the Dying
This book, published in 1974, is a compilation of the typical questions and answers that Elisabeth formulated in approximately seven hundred workshops, conferences and seminars after the appearance of her first book.
In this volume, Kübler-Ross reveals that his five-stage scheme does not intend to mark a way forward, or force the arrival of the last stage . In his words, “it should not be the goal to help people go through the five stages and reach the acceptance stage. Our goal should be to try to meet the needs of the patient, discover where he is and see how to help him in the best way. ”
In this book Elisabeth Kübler-Ross answers the most difficult questions to answer about death:
When should the doctor tell the patient about his terminal illness?
Is it necessary to tell him?
When does a patient start to die?
Patient questions:
I'm going to die?
When will I die?
Why does this happen to me?
Is it going to hurt?
What will happen when I die?
That I have to do?
Will all be well?
Am i a burden?
Can I ... one more time? (swim, see the ocean, go home)
Many times, people who know they are about to die ask questions that have no answers.
The important thing is to listen to them, be with them, accompany them in their last moments.
DRAFTING: Carolina, editor of the great family of the White Brotherhood
REFERENCES: Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (1974) Questions and Answers On Death and Dying. Macmillan editorial.
