End of life: bioethical reflection on medical education

Abstract

This qualitative study used the collective subject discourse method to identify the meanings, feelings and perception of medical students about death and terminally ill patients. In total, 60 students from a medical school in southern Minas Gerais were interviewed. For the meanings about end of life, the most common idea was “closure of life.” When the topic addressed was the feeling about terminal patients, the central ideas were “insecurity,” “impotence,” “frustration” and “anguish.” Regarding the preparation to deal with death and dying, “unpreparedness” was the most common. When considering how these themes are approached during training, “superficial approach,” “not very frequent” and “not addressed” emerged as ideas. We can thus conclude that the inexorability of death is not part of medical training, removing the possibility of rethinking care as a therapeutic form.