[Integrative review: a portrait of death and its implications in academic teaching].

This is an integrative literature review aimed at finding out how death, teaching about death and the dying process have been addressed in scientific publications in the health field. The research was performed using the Literatura da América Latina e Caribe em Ciências da Saúde e Base de Dados em Enfermagem (Latin America and Caribe Health Sciences Literature and Nursing Database) databases with the descriptors "death" and "teach". The survey covered national publications between 1998 and 2010, 14 articles were selected to compose the corpus of the study. The results indicated the lack of proper training by students, teachers and other health professionals to deal with death, since they had little or no preparation throughout their academic life. Thus, stimulating scientific production within this theme promotes a bigger diffusion of this specific knowledge and helps in the qualification and training of professionals to deal with death and the dying process.