Grief, Loss, and Dying During COVID-19 (FutureLearn)

For many, the kaleidoscope of conflicting feelings – grief, guilt, anger, anxiety, regret – is heightened. Leaders in organisations are finding it equally hard to know how to help staff.

As the uncertainties of the ‘survival’ phase of the crisis give way to a complex ‘new normal’, rituals and markers of death will continue to be disrupted and lives will be afflicted by chain reactions of loss.

The longer-term impacts of psychological and social stress on many population groups will surface, and therapeutic and self-help responses will need to be modified and expanded.

This course will introduce you to the key skills and principles required to provide effective, safe, and helping responses to anyone dealing with loss during this time.

What topics will you cover?

Week 1

- Introduction to the course

- Approaches to working with death and dying

- Minority ethnic communities and the pandemic

- Working during the pandemic - a hospital social worker speaks

Week 2

- The experiences of health and care staff during the pandemic

- Impossible choices - moral injury and the pandemic

- Inside the care homes and the Intensive care units

- Different cultures of care - medicine and the long term care of the dying

Week 3

- How families experienced the pandemic

- How people adjusted and coped

- The importance of rituals

Week 4

- What helped people cope - refuges, wobble rooms and reflection

- How to offer a safe reflective space for people in distress or overwhelmed by death and dying

- Beyond the crisis - will Covid change our attitudes to death and dying?

What will you achieve?

By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...

- Explore the changes inflicted on individuals and communities by Covid19 that necessitate adjustments to how we think about and manage people’s losses, and processes surrounding death and dying

- Reflect on the variety of lived experiences of the crisis and appreciate the importance of listening carefully to emotionally charged narratives

- Explore familiar theories and methods of work that respond to loss, grief and death within the new ‘frame’ of a post Covid19 world

- Explore how powerful feelings and disturbing thoughts can be passed around among people, making it hard to think clearly and retain perspective.

- Explore the differential impact of Covid19 on different sub populations, ethnic groups, workforce sectors, countries, and how helping responses need to take account of these variations

- Demonstrate a basic understanding of the skills and principle needed to facilitate ordinary ‘barefoot’ helping responses to a range of groups and individuals.