Themes of end-of-life care in memorable cases of medical health professionals: A mixed methods approach

Little is known regarding memorable cases and their impact on the personal and professional well-being of medical health professionals (MHP). As part of a survey focusing on professional burnout, 1123 MHP working at a leading tertiary pediatric medical center in Israel were approached, out of which 163 MHP answered and open-ended question recalling a memorable case and the influence it had on them. Mixed-methods integrating data collected from the larger study were employed to assess both quantitative and qualitative aspects of the memories recalled. Three key findings are presented: (1) the prominence of End-of-Life care among the memorable cases (n = 163, 58.28%) and its cross-disciplinary impact among professionals, (2) the importance of social support for professionals providing End-of-Life care, and (3) the high influence (mean impact = 4.27, from a scale of 1–5, 5 reflecting highest impact) attributed by the MHP to their memorable case resulting in multiple short (e.g., emotional reactions) and long-term effects (e.g., perspective changes), negative and positive, effecting quality of life and professional performance. In conclusion, recognizing and addressing End-of-Life related memories is noteworthy and bears direct clinical implications for developing interventions intended to mitigate patient care strain and promote MHP well-being personally and professionally.