Relatives' experience of the moment of death in a tertiary referral hospital

The moment of death carries a compelling image and dominant concept throughout history. However, the hospice says so little about this last moment of life, when cultural tradition has said so much. Historically, death was seen as a natural extension of life and the moment of death was held sacred. There was ritual and custom associated with this time for the person who was dying and the community. We wished to determine if this time still had significance in the acute hospital where a majority of deaths occur and to explore what added or detracted from this experience for relatives. In this article, we discuss the results of a qualitative enquiry into the moment of death in a hospital as experienced by relatives in Ireland. We interviewed 24 relatives of 15 patients who had died and who had been referred from a tertiary referral hospital to a consultative palliative care service soon after the death. The following themes emerged from the interviews, hospital as a place to die; quality of communication; location within hospital; attributes of staff. Finally, those we interviewed remembered in compelling detail and with heightened awareness, the humanity of staff, the mystery and spirituality of the moment of death, the acceptable and unacceptable aspects of their surroundings.