Literature Review

Funerals becoming a thing of the past as end-of-life rituals change County Life, by Sharon Harrison; 2/16/24As times are changing, more and more people don’t want a traditional, religious funeral and instead are seeking alternatives to align with present day values. 

‘A really low blow’: Michigan environmentalists say town banned all cemeteries to stop them from opening ‘green burial ground’Law & Crime, by Elura Nanos; 1/23/24A Michigan couple is asking a state court to strike down a local ordinance banning all cemeteries that they say was put in place just to stop them from opening the environmentally friendly burial ground they had planned for over a decade.

A looming crisis: Millennials caring for aging parentsFalls Church News-Press, by Brian Reach; 1/11/24... Millennials, born between 1981 and 1996, comprise roughly 73 million Americans. By 2030, all boomers, and over 70 million Americans in total, will be ages 65 and older. This represents an at least 25 percent increase in the number of senior citizens — in just over five years.

The Language of Hospice Can Help Us Get Better at Discussing DeathTIMEDecember 18, 2023Just because death is inevitable doesn’t make it easy or natural to talk about. In a new study, researchers wondered if hospice workers—experts in end-of-life care—had lessons to teach the rest of us when it came to speaking with patients and families about death. Daniel Menchik, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Arizona who studies the use of language in different fields of medicine, spent eight months sitting in on team meetings at a hospice care facility that were also open to patients’ families. ... In the study, Menchik noticed that hospice workers used three different types of verbs in meetings with family members: predictive, subjunctive, and imperative. Predictive verbs are used to assert things about the future and include words like “will” and “going to.” Imperative verbs carry a similar firmness, but include a call to action; the most common one Menchik encounters in medical settings is “should.” Subjunctive verbs convey some sort of personal stance when talking about the future. “Think,” “feel,” “want,” and many other expressive phrases fall in this category. When a family starts hospice care, “their capabilities to engage in intense conversations [about death] are usually pretty limited,” Menchik says. But he believes that hospice workers help bridge that gap by minimizing their use of imperative verbs. In meetings he observed, imperative verbs made up just 17% of the verb phrases used by hospice professionals. That’s fairly uncommon in medicine. Editor's Note: Use this article to examine the language used in your team meetings; to strengthen your orientation of employees from non-hospice settings; to engage your admissions nurses in a lively dialogue about its applicability to their experiences with patients and families.

It’s your funeral—Here’s how to plan so your loved ones don’t have toUnion Democrat (Sonora, CA)November 28, 2023Just 10% of people have told a funeral home in writing what their funeral plans are, according to NFDA surveys, and an even smaller share have pre-paid for their arrangements. So whether you are pre-planning your own funeral—as experts highly recommend by either talking with a funeral home or including it within your estate planning—or helping with a loved one’s arrangements, here are a few basics to start the conversation...