Palliative Workbook

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Palliative Workbook Questions

This is a temporary resource to help you with the first few Palliative Workbook chapters to answer in the meantime until your palliative workbook is available.

Ch.01 - Preparing to Care

Part 1: Understanding Your Beliefs and Baggage

  1. What is self-awareness? How would you describe it, in your own words?

  2. Identify an early experience you had related to death, dying and/or grief.

    • A) Describe the experience

    • B) What support did you receive?

    • C) How did this experience affect you?

  3. Which of the following descriptions below reflect some of your feelings about working with people who are dying?

    • Interested

    • Worried

    • Afraid

    • Feel ill

    • Unsure

    • Eager to Learn

    • Meditative

    • Concerned

    • Concerned

    • Glad that I can offer support

    • Nervous

    • Honoured

    • Other ______

  4. Offer some of the beliefs and baggage related to death, dying and/or grief that you carry with you to work. What beliefs and baggage will you need to put aside when caring for dying people? Provide at least 3.

Part 2: Solidifying Concepts

  1. As discussed in the “Maintaining Therapeutic Boundaries” section on pages 6 to 10 in the text, therapeutic boundaries are necessary when providing care. Maintaining therapeutic boundaries is not always easy.

    • A) How Might you know if you are not maintaining boundaries? Provide 3 answers

    • B) What steps can you take to establish therapeutic boundaries? Provide 3 answers

  2. In pairs or small groups, discuss the following:

    • Similarities and differences between your definition of self-awareness

    • Experiences you have had related to death, dying and/or grief

    • Feelings you have about working with people who are dying

    • The concept of baggage that you carry and the need to put baggage aside to care for others

  3. In small groups, discuss the story about the homeless woman on page 5 in the text. Think about and share an experience you had when you judged someone. Describe the feeling you had about the person. Did you attitude toward them change when learned more about them? If so, how did it change? What strategies can you use to help you learn not to judge or label someone?

Ch.02 - Understanding the Dying Process

Part 1: Understanding Your Beliefs and Baggage

  1. Think about the four different patterns of decline (trajectories) and place them in order of your most preferred (“good death”) to least preferred (“bad death”) way of dying. Draw and name each pattern. On the right-hand side, write two reasons why you placed them in the order you did.

  2. Reflect on the trajectory you would choose for a loved one

    • A) Which trajectory would you choose?

    • B) Did you want something different for your loved one than you wanted for yourself?

    • C) Is it harder or easier to imagine and choose a path for someone else? (Sometimes people find it more difficult to make decisions on behalf of another person). And people may choose more aggressive interventions for someone else than they would want for themselves)

Part 2: Solidifying Concepts

  1. How is dying different today than it was in time gone by? Provide 3 answers.

  2. Review the stories of different patterns of decline in chapter 2 of the text. Complete the table below.

    • A) Steady Decline

      • Impacts on the person (provide 2 answers)

      • Impacts on the family (provide 2 answers)

      • Ways that you as a PSW can support the person and the family (2 answers)

    • B) Stuttering Decline

      • Impacts on the person (provide 2 answers)

      • Impacts on the family (provide 2 answers)

      • Ways that you as a PSW can support the person and the family (2 answers)

    • C) Slow Decline

      • Impacts on the person (provide 2 answers)

      • Impacts on the family (provide 2 answers)

      • Ways that you as a PSW can support the person and the family (2 answers)

  3. When they understand the unique challenges associated with each pattern or trajectory of dying, PSWs can best support the dying person and the family, and individualize care to meet the person’s unique needs.

    • A) Why do you think it is important to help a dying person maintain their ability to make choices as long as possible?

    • B) List two strategies PSWs can use to support a dying person to maintain choicesPart 2: Solidifying Concepts

Part 3: Integrating into Practice

  1. It is important that you share information with the health care team about the dying person’s preferences and goals of care. Reflect on what you would want your family and the health care team to know about you, if they needed to care for you when you were dying. For example, location, interventions, people present, level of medication and so on.