‘You Took me Back to the sea:' Using Narrative to Explore and Inform the Practice of Social Work with Dying People

This article centres on a qualitative interview extract, the ‘Story of the Pebble', in which a West African Hospital Social Worker Ado, working in a UK context, and identifying as a Shaman, describes successfully trusting his instincts to create a symbol for a dying patient. Despite criticisms from colleagues, Ado's capacity to understand his patients needs are justified both before and after her death.The article discusses significant themes from the interview extract, including the meaning of professionalism, practice wisdom and cultural influences in a UK social work context, as well as through Ado's heritage and identification as a Shaman. The article considers holistic patient care in a medical context and suggests this has some useful lessons for social workers, particularly those involved with dying people. Although the extract, and wider research study from which it is drawn, pre-date the Covid 19 pandemic, this is referenced throughout, linking the interview extract to ways of helping practitioners and educators to consider people holistically at end of life. AD -, Chichester, UK ;, Chichester, UK

Doorways to the deathlands: The imaginal seeing of story

This chapter explore the places where therapist and client need to attend the witchy wise woman's lessons, by coming inside, moving beyond words, making good use of time and being ready to work in the currency of a 'magical logos' that is beyond what is known or fully understood. It will look at how story offers a doorway, through which one see into the silenced and paralyzed places one enters when mortality interrupts life, and dis-locate into the unvisited, imaginative realm called 'The Deathlands'. The chapter will be in a story form that starts by giving a context for story and ritual being vital soul-wise portals which guide during any process of death. It introduces the metaphor of a country, The Deathlands made up of four shires, each with an entry point or doorway through which people pass when they lose someone or become terminally ill. It looks at the kind of story that is played out in these days of Coronavirus, happening during the writing of this chapter. A traditional story will follow each description of The Deathland shires, intended to amplify imaginary, created story, with time-tested, magical wisdom of an ancient myth from tradition of different world cultures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Socio-economic and clinical drivers of COVID-19 mortality: An empirical analysis of the supply-side and demand-side moderators

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted everyday life globally, with severe consequences in several countries and regions. A key concern related to the COVID-19 pandemic is the wide variation in mortality across nations and sub-national locations such as states and counties. Anecdotal evidence, as well as evidence from CDC, indicates that the risk of spread as well as the risk of mortality from the pandemic is higher for regions with a population characterized by disadvantaged economic (income) and racial (underserved communities) and demographic profiles (age). Multiple studies have indicated that the most crucial step toward reducing mortality is expanding critical care capacity through procuring personal protective equipment (PPE) and ventilators and training critical care frontline employees. It is projected that with exponential growth in the pandemic spread, many regions would fall short of critical care capacity, increasing mortality.Furthermore, the pandemic has imposed high levels of constraints on resource availability, even in developed nations. Under resource constraints in critical care delivery, mitigation strategies need to account for the variation in observed cases and the disparity in mortality across locations. In my dissertation, I make a concerted effort to contribute toward understanding the sources of variation in mortality and propose a framework that enables pandemic preparedness and mitigation strategies that encapsulate the spatial and temporal variation in risk of mortality from COVID-19. The mitigation strategies are divided into supply-side and demand-side moderators of mortality. Accordingly, I focus on two mitigation strategies: (i) ICU capacity as a supply-side moderator and (ii) Vaccination coverage as a demand-side moderator. The overarching objective of my dissertation is to understand the role of supply-side and demand-side moderators of mortality, independently and jointly, of the association between socio-economic, demographic (henceforth referred to as social), and clinical risk factors and COVID-19 mortality. Much of the epidemiological literature on COVID-19 has focused on reducing the spread. However, the ultimate goal is to reduce mortality. There is a necessity in both practice and academic literature to understand actionable policies that can reduce mortality in general and spatial variation of mortality in specific. This dissertation research primarily leverages empirical methodology combining matching procedures with fixed effect modeling of panel data to test the hypothesized relationships of interest. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Children's Experiences of Death Anxiety and Responses to the Covid-19 Pandemic

The aim of this study was to explore children's experience and responses to the Covid-19 pandemic through their illustrations and short narrations. During October 2020 and January 2021 data was collected from thirteen children aged 9–10 years old in a primary school in the North-West of England. Children were asked to draw their thoughts and feelings about the pandemic and to write a short narration to accompany the drawing. Thematic analysis of data revealed that during the pandemic children at this age have an understanding of death, experience death anxiety and are able to use creative expression to facilitate meaning of the impact of lockdown on their lives such as feeling isolated, lonely, sad and bored. Creative expression also facilitated adaptive coping mechanisms derived from being able to spend more time with family. The data on primary school children is part of a larger study which involved surveys and interviews with children aged 12–16 years in secondary schools. AD -, Buckinghamshire, Milton Keynes, UK ;, Buckinghamshire, Milton Keynes, UK

The impact of individualism on the efficiency of epidemic control and the underlying computational and psychological mechanisms

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a global health crisis, and some countries experience difficulties in controlling the infection and mortality of COVID-19. Based on previous findings, we argue that individualistic cultural values are not conducive to the control of the epidemic. The results of the cross-cultural analysis showed that the individualistic cultural values positively predicted the number of deaths, deaths per million, and mortality of COVID-19, and the independent self-construct negatively predicted the efficiency of epidemic control in the early phase. The evolutionary game model and cross-cultural experiment further suggested that individualistic culture reduced the efficiency of overall epidemic control by enhancing individuals' fear of death in the context of the epidemic and increased individuals' tendency to violate epidemic control. Our results support the natural-behavioral-cultural co-evolution model, suggesting the impact of culture on the control of virus transmission and deaths during COVID-19, and provide an important scientific reference for countries to respond to global public health crises. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Black death and mourning as pandemic

Black bodies have been the site of devastation for centuries. We who inhabit and love these bodies live in a state of perpetual mourning. We mourn the disproportionate dying in our families, communities and the dying in the black diaspora. We are yet to come to terms with the death that accompanied the AIDS pandemic. Tuberculosis breeds in the conditions within which most of us live. We die from hours spent in the belly of the earth where we dig for minerals to feed the unquenchable thirst of capital. Malaria targets our neighbors with deathly accuracy. Ebola stalks west Africa where it has established itself as a rapacious black disease. It kills us. In the black diaspora, African Americans are walking targets for American police who kill and imprison them at rates that have created a prison industrial complex. Africans die in the Mediterranean ocean and join the spirits of ancestors drowned centuries ago. With South Africa as the point of departure, this paper stages a transcontinental examination of black death. It is animated by the following questions. What are the dimensions of black death, what is its scale and how is it mourned? What does the COVID-19 pandemic mean for we who are so intimately familiar with death? (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Birth, death and isolation: Motherhood during a pandemic

This chapter draws out the existential themes that have emerged for mothers during the Covid-19 pandemic and how they have had an impact on their lives. Birth, death and motherhood are all corporeal events which ground people in the physical dimension. Whereas the physical dimension of maternity in the pandemic was dominated by the safety and risk pole of existence for mothers, in the social dimension the focus was on isolation and belonging;and these two dimensions became interconnected. The way in which the issues of mortality and natality, of life and death, were manifested in women during the pandemic was through a preoccupation with the safety and risk pole of existence, which in turn led to worry, anxiety and fear. For women, those wanting to conceive during the pandemic it became a mission of trying to plan for the unknown. For the majority of women, the thought of giving birth is often felt with trepidation and anxiety about what will happen and how the birth will proceed but at the same time excitement and anticipation of finally meeting their baby. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

The impact of COVID-19 on the experiences of patients and their family caregivers with medical assistance in dying in hospital.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic and its containment measures have drastically impacted end-of-life and grief experiences globally, including those related to medical assistance in dying (MAiD). No known qualitative studies to date have examined the MAiD experience during the pandemic. This qualitative study aimed to understand how the pandemic impacted the MAiD experience in hospital of persons requesting MAiD (patients) and their loved ones (caregivers) in Canada. METHODS: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with patients who requested MAiD and their caregivers between April 2020 and May 2021. Participants were recruited during the first year of the pandemic from the University Health Network and Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, Canada. Patients and caregivers were interviewed about their experience following the MAiD request. Six months following patient death, bereaved caregivers were interviewed to explore their bereavement experience. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and de-identified. Transcripts were analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis. RESULTS: Interviews were conducted with 7 patients (mean [SD] age, 73 [12] years; 5 [63%] women) and 23 caregivers (mean [SD] age, 59 [11] years; 14 [61%] women). Fourteen caregivers were interviewed at the time of MAiD request and 13 bereaved caregivers were interviewed post-MAiD. Four themes were generated with respect to the impact of COVID-19 and its containment measures on the MAiD experience in hospital: (1) accelerating the MAiD decision; (2) compromising family understanding and coping; (3) disrupting MAiD delivery; and (4) appreciating rule flexibility. CONCLUSIONS: Findings highlight the tension between respecting pandemic restrictions and prioritizing control over the dying circumstances central to MAiD, and the resulting impact on patient and family suffering. There is a need for healthcare institutions to recognize the relational dimensions of the MAiD experience, particularly in the isolating context of the pandemic. Findings may inform strategies to better support those requesting MAiD and their families during the pandemic and beyond.

Towards a Dignified Death: A New Approach to Care for People Using Substances Who Are at, or Near, the End of Their Lives.

There are no effective intervention studies for people using substances who are at, or near, the end of their lives. The needs of this group of people have been consistently overlooked even within the literature that identifies marginalised groups of people in need of greater recognition in palliative and end-of-life care. The aims of the project were to: (i) determine what a new, co-produced, model of care should look like for people using substances needing palliative and end-of-life care, and (ii) establish whether the new model had the potential to improve people's access to, and experience of, end-of-life care. This paper presents the development of the new approach to care. It was developed using participatory action research principles over a course of online workshops during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown period in the UK. A theory of change that aims to inform future policy and practice development is presented. While the ambition of the research was stunted by the pandemic, the process of its development and dissemination of the model and its resources has continued. Response from participants highlighted the importance of this work, however, in this new field of policy and practice, preparatory work that engages a wide range of stakeholders is crucial to its success. This relationship building and topic engagement are major parts of implementation before more substantial and sustainable development goals can be met.

PP07.002 The impact of advance care planning on place of death during the COVID-19 pandemic

BackgroundAt the beginning on the COVID-19 pandemic, advance care planning (ACP) was widely encouraged and endorsed for adults with serious illness to ensure their treatment and care preferences would be honoured, including location of death, often considered a surrogate quality indicator for end-of-life care. Coordinate My Care (CMC) represents the UK's largest Electronic Palliative Care Coordination System that comprises an ACP component.We aimed to examine the impact of ACP on place of death for people who died during the COVID-19 pandemic with a CMC record.MethodsRetrospective cohort analysis of CMC records for people aged over 18 who died between 20/03/20 and 05/03/21 with recorded place of death. Socio-demographic, clinical and ACP-related factors associated with achieving preferred place of death (PPD) were examined using logistic regression.Results11,913 records were included. 76.9% patients died in their preferred place location of death (57.7% Home, 31.4% Care Home, 7.5% Hospice, 3.3% Hospital, 0.1% Other). An increased likelihood of dying in PPD was associated with a ‘Not for resuscitation' (DNACPR) status (OR=1.51, 95% CI 1.17 to 1.93), a Ceiling of Treatment for Symptomatic Treatment (when compared to Full active treatment, OR=3.52, 95% CI 2.77 to 4.50), documented family discussions regarding resuscitation recommendations (OR=1.51, 95% CI 1.33 to 1.72) and 2+ non-urgent care record views in the 30 days before death (OR=1.27, 95% CI 1.13 to 1.43). People from materially deprived areas had a decreased likelihood of dying in their PPD (OR= 0.65, 95% CI 0.54 to 0.79).ConclusionsModifiable elements of ACP significantly influence place of death, even when controlling for socio-economic and demographic determinants. In times of crisis, effective ACP is central to delivering high quality end-of-life care;ACP related factors must be considered in ongoing research on end-of-life outcomes.

Association of income, education, employment and COVID-19 mortality in Brazil

The increased mortality rates from COVID-19 in Brazil have adversely affected vulnerable populations and placed a severe burden on its public health system as compared to other nations. Focusing on socioeconomic status as a risk factor in this retrospective cohort study, I investigated the association between Brazilian COVID-19mortality rate, income, school enrollment rate, and employment rate after controlling for the demographics and immunization rate. This is an important issue as an increase in incidence and mortality rates affects how governmental and public health leaders can effectively control and prevent disease spread. Using the fundamental causes of disease theory as the theoretical framework, I evaluated the underlying influence of socioeconomic factors on COVID-19 mortality at different geographic levels (region, state, and capital). Therefore, the foci of these three manuscripts is the need to assess this influence to encourage governmental response through better planning, strategies, and actions toward socioeconomic equality in Brazil, which could promote a reduction in the COVID-19 mortality rate. Most findings do not agree with the theory tested, which can be explained by a series of other factors, such as population density and heterogeneity.Thus, there are still inconsistencies regarding how minority groups are at greater risk of disease contamination and death. The social change implications of this study include a potential increase in opportunities for socioeconomic equality. A decrease in the COVID19 mortality rate could also allow Brazilians to improve individual lives with healthier families and communities. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Bodies in Transit: Speculation and the Biopolitical Imaginary

This essay explores the Bodies in Transit archive, an artifact of mid-nineteenth-century public health administration in New York City. The ledgers, which tracked the transit of every corpse that moved through the island of Manhattan between 1859 and 1894 and categorized entrants by their cause of death, nationality, and occupation, present a unique lens through which I explore the intersections of speculation, biopolitics, and urban space. I first establish a conceptual framework of "speculation" by dissecting its etymological genealogy, the roots of which share a preoccupation with vision and sight. I note that in practice, the ing and rationalizing tendencies of speculation operate by envisioning, calculating, and coercing specific outcomes into realization. I apply this framework to Bodies in Transit to historicize the ways in which biopolitics, the means through which the state forms, represents, and manages populations, are indexed to speculative economic practices. I read Bodies in Transit through the framework of speculation to articulate a field of meaning that illuminates the complex material and epistemic conditions surrounding its implementation and utility. As I argue, the ledgers were a response to the acceleration of real estate speculation in Manhattan, a trend that incentivized property owners to disinter burial grounds to relocate corpses to rural areas, and thereby connected the speculative logics of real estate to those of public health, spatial order, and surveillance. By thinking across and through the layered meanings of "speculation," this essay illuminates how the state's economy of knowledge is intimately related to biopolitical practices of surveillance and representations of financial value in the modern city.

A Catholic Christian understanding of autism spectrum disorder and grief within the funeral setting

Attending the funeral of a loved one offers bereaved individuals the opportunity to say goodbye to the deceased, providing closure to the grieving loved one and concretizing the deceased's death. Within the Catholic-Christian tradition, the funeral rite is seen as an act of worship, a part of the more powerful story of salvation. Within this belief system, the funeral rite represents the deceased loved one's soul returning to God in the afterlife. It is a way to thank God for the endless mercy He has shown His children on Earth. Under the helpful guidance and expertise of funeral directors, funeral proceedings allow family and friends to grieve the loss of their loved one, surrounded by a community of prayer and support, which can provide a step toward healing. However, certain groups of individuals are commonly deprived of the opportunity to participate in or attend the funeral of a loved one. People in the autism community can fall into this category, as their grief is often disenfranchised. Their experience of disenfranchised grief can be problematic, as excluding these individuals from the funeral service may impact their grief and mourning process. Because grief reactions within people with autism are understudied, little is known as how to adequately address the needs of these individuals at the funeral of a loved one. Also, many funeral directors do not receive formal training on how to work with people with autism. Thus, they may not be aware of the extra support that individuals with autism may need when attending a funeral service.Therefore, through the lens of Catholic-Christian integration, this dissertation seeks to examine how grief manifests within people with autism more fully. Specifically, this dissertation examines the role that funeral attendance may play in their grief processes. Moreover, using archival data from a pilot study, a training program for funeral directors will be examined for its effectiveness. Furthermore, interview data from professionals in the field of autism and grief will be analyzed and discussed. Combining a thorough literature review of the topic with data from professionals in the field, this dissertation aims to better understand how grief manifests within this population, specifically as it relates to funeral attendance. Throughout the dissertation, the need for grief studies and interventions within the autism community will be highlighted, especially during this time of increased death and subsequent grief and mourning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Dreaming On: Dying Behaviour and the Romantic-Individualist Ethos

Over the last two decades and, most recently because of the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a growing interest in studying topics related to dying and death in various fields of research. Research has started to explore, in more detail, death and bereavement among nonreligious people in contemporary Western societies. It is now well established that this large social group finds its own meaningful ways to come to terms with grief, loss and finitude. However, these studies typically do not include the perspectives of those living with life-threatening illness and facing death. Drawing on one and a half years of ethnographic research conducted among patients receiving palliative care in Switzerland, this study explores how a nonreligious orientation and other facets of human existence influence emotions and meaning making while dying. This is exemplified by the case of an atheist who I picked from the totality of fieldwork encounters in order to illuminate the nuances and complexities of living with terminal illness. The study found that secular and individualist values make it difficult to find closure and accept death. At the same time, the results show that the identification with the secular features of a worldview can increase well-being by ensuring a sense of permanence in actions and meaning-making habits in dying. Furthermore, this article makes the case for studying attitudes towards dying and death in relation to time and life situation.

Whither critical Management and Organization Studies? For a performative critique of capitalist flows in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic

Over the last few months, COVID-19 has entered our own consciousness as a moment of profound disruption, leading in too many cases to misery and death, but also, forcing us more mundanely to reorganize our lives, work and social relations. The disruption of capitalist flows by the pandemic has exacerbated the cleavages and power inequalities. Addressing them can help critical MOS to reconnect the places and times of production and paid work to the circulation and consumption of goods and services and, more broadly, to social reproduction. This is necessary to identify the contradictions at the heart of capitalism, denaturalize it as a mode of organizing the economy and society, and envision more just flows and novel subjectivities. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Understanding daily psychological well-being in the context of the early COVID-19 environment

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic led to a pervasive environment that was both novel and unescapable for people everywhere. This prolonged and massive event operated across multiple levels of influence with impacts ranging from the most distal global environment to the most proximal immediate environment of daily life. Individuals had to deal with wide-spread challenges and uncertainties, including coping with stay-at-home orders, adapting to new safety requirements and policies, and facing fear and risk of infection as well as symptoms from the virus itself. In order to investigate the impacts of this environment on daily psychological well-being, this dissertation identified innovative environmental measures of that COVID-19 environment and connected them to individuals' ecological momentary assessment outcomes, bridging community level indicators with person level experiences. This work addressed a critical gap in the COVID-19 literature, namely that COVID-19 pandemic was not a monolithic experience but a dynamic and complex environment. Specifically, Study 1 examined the role of daily changes in COVID-19 severity at the state level by using reported cases and deaths in February and March of 2020 to predict daily distress and distress variability in emerging adults. It also considered the differential effects of accumulated cases (or deaths) and daily new cases (or deaths). Study 2 examined relationships between community level COVID-19 information seeking and individual worry and coping self-efficacy. Internet search data was used as an indicator of community information seeking based on high interest search terms related to COVID-19 and critical lockdown material resources. Findings from both studies provide support for the role of the COVID-19 environment in daily well-being at multiple levels of influence. Distress, worry, and coping all showed evidence of environmental influences. Additionally, this work supports the critical need for investigating environments and their connections over time in models that allow both the environment and the individuals to change. This work has implications for understanding the complicated well-being effects of the COVID-19 environment and findings can be expanded to other crisis and chronic stress environments. It also provides a model for more precise within-person research that better models and measures environments and the impact of those environments on key individual health and well-being outcomes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

The experience of family members who have had a loved one in physical restraint in a critical care setting during the COVID-19 pandemic: A qualitative study using a phenomenological design

Limited accounts of family members' experiences with loved ones who have been physically restrained in ICU settings (Ones, 2020;Singer et al., 2020) have left a gap in providing respectful, responsive patient care. One study estimated that physical restraint was being used at the rate of 50 per 1,000 patient days. Currently, it is estimated that approximately 27,000 people are placed in physical restraints each day in U.S. hospitals. ICUs are responsible for 56% of all restraint days, despite accounting for only 16% of all patient days (Mion, 2008). According to Abdeljawad and Mrayyan (2016), patients may experience trauma with the use of these devices. In order to better comprehend the effects following physical restraint use, this dissertation explored the perceptions of family members with loved ones who have been physically restrained, with a focus on their application in critical care settings during the COVID-19 pandemic.While no scientific evidence of physical restraint efficacy is available, there is much evidence of its risk. Another study reported that in hospitals in the United States, the prevalence of using physical restraints is approximately with 53% of all patients. Further, the prevalence of using restraints on patients in critical care units is 75%. With the increased use of physical restraint, the mortality and morbidity rates are expected to increase, due to serious consequences of physical restraint that can result in confusion, deconditioning, pressure injuries, strangulation, death, and adverse psychological effects (Rakhmatullina et al., 2013). In the extant literature, limited studies have explored family members' experiences of loved ones being physically restrained (Ones, 2020). The findings from this study included the following themes: Theme 1: Having to Deal with Complications and Difficulties Encountered Preceding, During, and Post Hospitalization;Theme 2: Experiences That Are Identified as Negative;Theme 3: Understanding of Hospital Staff Intentions;Theme 4: The Need for Physical Restraint Intervention (PRI) May Be Justifiable but Stirs up Negative Emotions;and Theme 5: Feelings of Ambivalence Associated with PRI. The study provides an understanding of family members' perception of these experiences. These insights may help health care clinicians improve the experience of patient care, safety, and quality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

"And Then COVID Hit": (Re)flexibility of Digital Storytelling in Qualitative Health Research

The purpose of our qualitative health research study was to understand the experiences of Ontarians who accompanied someone throughout their dying process using medical assistance in dying (MAiD). The second phase used digital stories as a method to examine and share these experiences at the end of life. And then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and we faced a pivot to our original plan. This pivot resulted in reinforcing the myriad benefits of using digital storytelling in qualitative health research. And rather than detracting from the initial study, we also learned that digital storytelling is a flexible method that can be creatively, compassionately, and effectively conducted in virtual spaces. We will employ digital storytelling in future qualitative health research as both a component of studies but also as a conduit for explorations of other tools of data collection and dissemination. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of International Journal of Qualitative Methods is the property of Sage Publications Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

COVID-19 - what did/can we learn from this?

Whilst acute health services were focused on and over-burdened with battling the pandemic, other health sectors such as the care and treatment of chronic and long-term diagnoses and rehabilitation services, were temporarily either suspended or put on the back burner. In this edition, we feature two articles related to COVID-19 pandemic: one explores the possible effects of the COVID-19 lockdown on occupational therapy clients1, and one comments on the experience of students2 who, as part of their curriculum requirements, needed to complete a research project without having access to clinical areas due to lockdown. The other shares how masculinity develops in South African townships8 and the value of mentors and stand-in parents that allow boys to take up non-conforming and non-hegemonic identifies and achieve their personal long-term goals despite the circumstance they grow up in. Ramano E, Pretorius W, de Jager M, Oldfield T, Scriba D, Moriti B. Occupational Therapists' perceived ability to treat and assist bereaved individuals to And new meaning in life through engagement in meaningful activities. Whilst acute health services were focused on and over-burdened with battling the pandemic, other health sectors such as the care and treatment of chronic and long-term diagnoses and rehabilitation services, were temporarily either suspended or put on the back burner. In this edition, we feature two articles related to COVID-19 pandemic: one explores the possible effects of the COVID-19 lockdown on occupational therapy clients1, and one comments on the experience of students2 who, as part of their curriculum requirements, needed to complete a research project without having access to clinical areas due to lockdown.

A New Age for Religious Demand: Spiritual Care and Mental Well-Being

Faced with this new need for an enhanced spirituality, it is only natural that religions are called to play a vital role, but the target may be somewhat different from a more traditional emphasis on grand or Big Questions: creation, life and death, sin and atonement, recognition of the Absolute, heaven and hell, and so on. Since the last phase of the 20th century, an opposing philosophy has been advanced under the term "Postmodernism," which is characterized by pluralism and relativism, rejecting the universal validity of stable identity and hierarchy, emphasizing the rights of minor and weaker segments of the population, and calling for social participation of women, for example. Many problems caused by COVID-19 physically and mentally have been handled by medical doctors together with clerics, though of course the situation was unprecedented for all involved. [...]COVID-19 has intensified and highlighted the seriousness of these small and individual questions. Let us start with the development of new fields of academic research, followed by discussion of actual practices on the ground. a.Study of Death and Grief Care Study of Death (thanatology) entails the description or investigation of death and dying and people's psychological coping mechanisms, hence, it aims to contribute to alleviating sorrow and stress experienced by the dying and to the treatment of mental pain of all those who suffer in the last stage of life.