PTH 1400 - Counseling the Dying Patient

Counseling the Dying Patient

Doctorate Degree in Pastoral Counseling & Thanatology

PTH 1400

Breyer State University
Instructor: Juan Kenigstein, PH.D, M.ED., GC-C

SYLLABUS

COURSE OVERVIEW: Welcome to Counseling the Dying Patient, a Doctorate Level course in the curriculum for the Degree, Doctorate in Pastoral Counseling & Thanatology. I'm pleased to offer you this course. This is an exciting course. Our personal philosophy about life and people impact upon our relationship with others. These assumptions about people and their motives influences how we see clients, the philosophy and theory of counseling we use, the style of therapeutic relationships we develop, the kind of counseling goals we help clients set, and the interventions we use to help clients meet their goals.

TIME FRAME: This is a six-semester hour course. This course is allotted ten weeks of time. You must complete all of the requirements for the course successfully by the end of the ten-week period. The first day of week one will begin the day that you register for the course, or the day which you notify me that your text book(s) have arrived and you are ready to begin your studies. Please be cognizant of the time frame. It is rare that extensions of time are permitted, unless you have good justification. Upon successful completion of this course, you will be awarded six semester hours of credit. Students may accelerate, but may not complete this course in less than four weeks.

TEXTBOOK: There is one (1) required textbook for this course.

Book 1: Clinical Dimensions of Anticipatory Mourning: Theory And Practice In Working With The Dying, Their Loved Ones, And Their Caregivers, Research Press, Therese A. Rando, Champaign , IL. 2000: ISBN # 0-87822-380-0.

Book 2: Working With The Dying And Bereaved. Routledge, Edited by Pauline Sutcliffe, Guinevere Tufnell & Ursula Cornish, New York: NY, 1998: ISBN # 0-415-91994-0.

These texts may be found at your local bookstore. Your local bookstore most often will order them as a special order for you. Or, you may purchase them online from:

Amazon.com at
www.amazon.com

Barnes & Nobel at
www.bn.com

Borders Books at
www.borders.com

EXAMINATIONS: There are no examinations for this course; grades are based on completion of assignments and activities.

GRADING SCALE: The grading scale for this course is as follows:

90-100%    = A
80-89%      = B
70-79%      = C
Below 70% = Fail

GRADING COMPOSITION:

Five activities                            40%
Self evaluation                          10%
Research Report                       20%
Discovery & Intention Statement10%
One Case Study                       10%
Two Critiques                            10%

TOTAL 100%

GOALS: The aim of counseling the Dying patient is to use a systematic approach to work within a particular systematic model each with its characteristics techniques.

COMMUNICATION: You are encouraged to communicate with me. I am available as a teacher, coach, and mentor to assist you in meeting your goals for this course. Primarily, communication is through email. However, I am also available for conversation by telephone if you would like. Our classroom for this course has a "chat" room. I am also very willing to meet with you one-on-one in the chat room at your request. From time to time, depending on how many students are enrolled in this course at a particular time, we will have some scheduled group chats. You will receive more detailed information at the time such chat sessions are scheduled. Please keep my email address handy so that you can contact me whenever necessary. Upon registration, you will receive my email address. If at any time during this course you change your email address, please be sure to notify me right away.

COURSE OBJECTIVES: Upon completion of this course, you will be able to:

1). Understand and describe their personal counseling philosophy.
2). Identify, understand and describe approaches, which blend with their personal philosophy about life and people.
3). Understand and describe "terminal illness"
4). Discuss and practice therapeutic interventions.
5). Understand and be able to formulate an effective treatment plan.
6). Understand the Dying person and his/her family.
7). Demonstrate ability to identify and discuss the presenting problem and possible approaches to use.
8). Demonstrate basic ability to follow the client during the initial stages of counseling.
9). Understand and describe the Hospice Program of Care.

COURSE OUTLINE:

1). A family systems perspective on loss, recovery and resilience.
2). The relevance of tears: reconstructing the mourning process from a systemic perspective.
3). Death of a parent in a family with young children: working with the aftermath.
4). Death of a pupil in school.
5). On the brink - managing suicidal teenagers.
6). A 'dysfunctional triangle" or love in all the right places: social context in the therapy of a family living with AIDS.
7). Working systematically with older people and their families who have 'come to grief.
8). Anticipatory Mourning: A Review and Critique of the Literature.
9). The Six Dimensions of Anticipatory Mourning.
10). Re-Creating Meaning in the Face of Illness.
11). Anticipatory Mourning and the Transition to Loving in Absence.
12). Anticipatory Mourning and the Transition of Fading Away.
13). On the Experience of Traumatic Stress in Anticipatory and Post death Mourning.
14). Anticipatory Mourning and Coping with Dying: Similarities, Differences, and Suggested Guidelines for Helpers.
15). Denial and the Limits of Anticipatory Mourning.
16). Towards an Appropriate Death.
17). Grief in Dying Persons.
18). Promoting Healthy Anticipatory Mourning in Intimates of the Life-Threatened or Dying Person.
19). Anticipatory Mourning: Challenges for Professional and Volunteer Caregivers.
20). Anticipatory Mourning and Prenatal Diagnosis.
21). Dealing with the Chronic/Terminal Illness or Disability of a Child: Anticipatory Mourning.
22). Anticipatory Mourning in HIV/AIDS.
23). Mourning Psychosocial Loss: Anticipatory Mourning in Alzheimer's, ALS, and Irreversible Coma.
24). Advance Directives and Anticipatory Mourning.
25). Anticipatory Mourning and Organ Donation.
26). Anticipatory Mourning and the Human-Animal Bond.