Dealing with Loss: Perceptions of Speech-Language Pathologists

by Wojan, Jennifer D.

The purpose of the study was to obtain information of speech-language pathologists’ experiences with the death of a patient. Three hundred sixty-five subjects who work primarily with medically fragile patients completed a survey. The questionnaire contained items ranging from the number of patient deaths the speech-language pathologist experienced to the coping strategies utilized by speech-language pathologists following both the sudden and anticipated death of patients. From the results, we were able to create a profile of both the impact of the death of a patient and the degree of impact those deaths have upon a speech-language pathologist.