Understanding staff experiences of sudden death in Emergency Dept. v.1
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Understanding staff experiences of sudden death in Emergency Department and its implication to provision of care
IRAS ID
273841
Contact name
Laszlo Penzes
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Southampton - Faculty of Environmental and Life Sciences / School of Health Sciences
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
MED1670, University Hospital Southampton R&D reference
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 11 months, 1 days
Research summary
Sudden death represents a form of death that is unexpected in its nature or timing. The term can be applied when someone that is seemingly fit and well dies unexpectedly, but also includes people for example that are on a palliative trajectory, but die much sooner than expected. Bereavement caused by a sudden death event can be a stressful life experience, associated with the development of psychiatric disorders, making mental health consequences of witnessing an unexpected death, an important public health concern.
This research study will explore the lived experiences of staff in relation to death in the Emergency Department. Data will be collected using narrative, in-depth interviews and short reflective interviews with ED staff and qualitative observations in the clinical areas of Emergency Department.
Narrative interviews will be grounded in open-ended questions, allowing the participants with various clinical backgrounds, including doctors, nurses and healthcare assistants to elaborate and answer in more details, describing freely, without any constrain, the events and all associated emotions. The main purpose of clinical observations is to have a better understanding and capturing of the context within which people interact or a firsthand experience with the setting which will allow me to open to discovery rather than guessing what the context is like. Reflective interviews with staff will be conducted whenever observation is not possible, but staff's experience present during a sudden death event could be collected.
The study will seek to understand the consequences of such a devastating event and its potential implication on provision of care, with the broader purpose to inform practice and facilitate improvement in preparation of staff for managing such traumatic events.
REC name
South Central - Hampshire A Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
20/SC/0103
Date of REC Opinion
20 Mar 2020
REC opinion
Unfavourable Opinion