Moss Miriam S, Moss Sidney Z, Rubinstein Robert L, Black Helen K
Polisher Research Institute, Abramson Center for Jewish Life, North Wales, Pennsylvania, USA.
J Gerontol B Psychol Sci Soc Sci. 2003 Sep;58(5):S290-6. doi: 10.1093/geronb/58.5.s290.
Caregiving staff need to have a way to make sense out of the death and dying of nursing home residents. A range of cultural and institutional factors (e.g., disenfranchised grief; professional distance) thwart their expression of grief. This research examines the neglected area of staff's social construction of the meaning of their relationship with dying and deceased residents.
As part of a multisite ethnographic study of bereavement in long-term care, we analyzed themes in audiotranscribed in-depth qualitative interviews with 26 hands-on caregiving staff members (over two thirds were nurse's aides) in two religiously and culturally diverse nursing homes.
A theme of family metaphor emerged as staff members spoke of family-like thoughts, feelings, and behaviors toward long-term residents. Staff members spontaneously told stories of deaths in their own families, and they described how the meanings of resident deaths and family deaths were interrelated.
The family metaphor provides cultural scripts that enable staff to overcome barriers to the expression of grief. The family metaphor structures the meaning for staff of death and bereavement, and it provides a bridge between their work and personal experience.
护理人员需要有一种方式来理解疗养院居民的死亡。一系列文化和制度因素（例如，被剥夺的悲伤；职业距离）阻碍了他们表达悲伤。本研究考察了护理人员对与濒死及已故居民关系意义的社会建构这一被忽视的领域。
作为一项关于长期护理中丧亲之痛的多地点人种学研究的一部分，我们分析了对两家宗教和文化背景多样的疗养院中26名实际护理人员（超过三分之二是护士助理）进行的深入定性访谈的录音文字记录中的主题。
当工作人员谈到对长期居民有类似家人的想法、感受和行为时，出现了家庭隐喻的主题。工作人员自发讲述了自己家庭中的死亡故事，并描述了居民死亡和家庭死亡的意义是如何相互关联的。
家庭隐喻提供了文化脚本，使工作人员能够克服表达悲伤的障碍。家庭隐喻构建了死亡和丧亲之痛对工作人员的意义，并且在他们的工作和个人经历之间架起了一座桥梁。
