Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
Palliative Medicine
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Chow, A. Y.
Right arrow Articles by Yuen, K. F.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Chow, A. Y.
Right arrow Articles by Yuen, K. F.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati  
What's this?

Qualitative study of Chinese widows in Hong Kong: insights for psycho-social care in hospice settings

Amy YM Chow

Cecilia LW Chan

Department of Social Work and Social Administration, and Centre on Behavioral Health, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

Samuel MY Ho

Department of Psychology, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

Doris MW Tse

Margaret HP Suen

Karen FK Yuen

Caritas Medical Centre, Hospital Authority, Hong Kong

In an exploratory, phenomenological study of seven Chinese widows in Hong Kong, five major themes are identified: relationship with the deceased, relationship with others, grief reactions, coping and emotional expression. This paper focuses on the first theme: the widows' relationship with the deceased husband along a timeline from the time of diagnosis to after death. The experiences in the final days with the deceased were frequently referred to when the informants talked about this theme. This paper aims to give added voice, based on the experience of Chinese widows, to the possible role of hospice and palliative care on influencing the bereavement experience. Issues of awareness and acceptance of death, the supportive environment and support for family carers, the moment of death, creation of legacies, and sensitivity towards cultural embedded practices, are discussed. It is hoped that the experiences of these bereaved widows will stimulate new research to elucidate and verify the findings reported in this paper.

Key Words: bereavement • Chinese • palliative care • pre-bereavement • widows

Palliative Medicine, Vol. 20, No. 5, 513-520 (2006)
DOI: 10.1191/0269216306pm1168oa
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?