Nurses’ attitudes to death: changes with the COVID-19 pandemic ARTIGO ORIGINAL

Objective: to analyze nurses’ attitudes to death in the hospital setting before and after the first critical period of the COVID-19 pandemic. Method: quantitative, cross-sectional, comparative study. Data collection was conducted in a hospital in Portugal, using the Death Attitude Profile Assessment Scale. In 2018, 900 nurses participated and, in 2020, 995. Descriptive and inferential statistical analysis was performed. Results: regarding the profile of participants in the two groups, significant differences in age (p=0.001) and professional category (p=0.008) were identified. In attitudes to death, Avoidance had a significant difference between nurses before and during the pandemic (p=0.014), and was higher in the latter moment. Conclusion: the fact that Avoidance is more recurrent after the pandemic shows the importance of preparing the teams to face death in order to ensure the quality of end-of-life care and minimize nurses’ psychological suffering.

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