Seven out of 10 people said that Covid-19 prevented a loved one having death they would have wished for - survey

A survey by The Irish Hospice Foundation has found that seven out of 10 people said that Covid-19 prevented their loved one from having the death they would have wished for. The Time to Reflect survey found that the pandemic had a “profound impact” on people’s experience of death, dying and grieving. Hospice Foundation CEO Paula O’Reilly told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland that the recommendations from the survey must be used in the future to inform public health responses.

The survey, which was carried out towards the end of 2021 and into 2022, will be launched today at the foundation’s eighth biannual forum on “End of Life on Dying and Grieving Well in Our Communities”. It was carried out to gather insights into the experiences of individuals regarding end-of-life care, death and bereavement during the pandemic, she explained.

“For the Irish Hospice Foundation, one of the most important things for us is in terms of the conversation about dying, death and bereavement and people’s understanding of that.

The study did show that 70 percent of people did actually express having engaged in conversations and thought about their own end of life

“So we thought it would be really important to look at, firstly, whether people’s perception of dying, death and bereavement had changed over the pandemic and then secondly, it was really important at such a difficult time to hear what were the personal experiences of people, who had either experienced the death of someone during that time or were bereaved and were going through that through the loss at the time.

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“The survey was a national survey where we had over 2,200 people respond. And of that, 50 per cent of people reported having had someone close to them die in that period, and actually 40 per cent had one or more people die and it was a very difficult time.

“The study did show that 70 per cent of people did actually express having engaged in conversations and thought about their own end of life, putting plans in place, speaking with family members, which is really important to do before, unfortunately, you become unwell.”

Ms O’Reilly said that Ireland as a country was known for its funerals, for its wakes and the comfort that they provide for families and friends.

The public health guidelines during the pandemic had a big impact and it was “very socially isolating”. “What is really positive in the report is that it shows that we did find alternative ways. Like that, you did have people lining the streets when someone was being buried because they couldn’t go to the grave. So I think it did show that as a community we did rally around when someone died. One of the people in the survey talked about going home to a house, not having had a memorial service, not being able to share the memories, and how difficult that was.”

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The Hospice Foundation will be taking the key findings from the survey and using them to inform future policy and advocacy work in public health and to provide additional guidance for future programmes. Mr O’Reilly said that she hoped the survey results could “feed into” the Covid inquiry. “There’s a lot of documented, information there of how people experience death that can inform public policy. So I think it’d be really important to include that.”

The results of the survey found:

• Half of respondents asked (54 per cent) had experienced the death of someone close to them;
• Half of the respondents (54 per cent) reported that their loved one received the level of care they needed at end of life;
• More than six in 10 (64 per cent) of those bereaved said their ability to grieve was negatively affected;
• Seven in 10 (70 per cent) people reported that family and friends were excluded from funerals because of public health measures;
• Four in 10 (40 per cent) people did not receive the support they needed following the death of a loved one.;
• Six in 10 (67 per cent) people said they have greater awareness of grief since the pandemic;
• Almost half (47 per cent) have given more thought to their own end-of-life wishes;
• Over half (54 per cent) stated that people in their community found other ways, in the absence of traditional ones, to honour the person who had died.
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