Festival blog

Nursing Memories

In our work on bereavement and within our own teaching we have found a number of nursing students have encountered bereavements, personally or professionally. Within classes there is little opportunity to discuss bereavement or grief– and little ‘thinking time’ to consider the wider aspects of our own mortality. Often students feel isolated, and there aren't many forums where discuss bereavement in a safe and informal

Last November, at the Nursing & Health Care School at the University of Glasgow we hosted a ‘remembrance cafe’ for student nurses. We brought together students over a drink and a snack, to talk, share memories and remember friends and family who have died. There was a space to write messages to absent friends, and a chance to contribute to a collage of photographs.

This event enabled students to have a forum to share experiences. We also see this as a fantastic opportunity to get the next generation thinking and openly discussing the grief and death and thereby eroding the idea that this topic is ‘unmentionable’ and out of bounds.

Diane Wills and Jane Joy, Nursing & Health Care School , Glasgow University