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Stacey Dooley goes behind the scenes at an undertakers in new OU/BBC documentary

Stacey Dooley goes behind the scenes at an undertakers in new OU/BBC documentary

Stacey Dooley: Inside the Undertakers, takes a fascinating and surprisingly uplifting look behind the doors of a funeral director to discover more about the usually hidden side of death. In this one-off OU/BBC co-production, which airs on 9 November at 9pm on BBC ONE and iPlayer, presenter Stacey Dooley immerses herself in the day-to-day work […]

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Dying Matters Awareness Week – test your knowledge

Dying Matters Awareness Week – test your knowledge

Dying Matters Awareness Week highlights the importance of talking about dying, death and bereavement. The Open University has an abundance of information on the subject, curated by experts from across Health & Social Care. Get interactive Life or Death Decisions  Would you be able to help your friends and family get the care they want […]

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baby loss

On the death of a baby: Parents experience of grief and loss

Dr Kerry Jones is a Lecturer in End of Life Care and researches bereavement across the whole life span. In this article, she debunks some common misconceptions and outlines ways to support parents who are going through this loss. “ It doesn’t matter how many babies we do or don’t have, you can’t ever replace […]

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Seven things to remember when supporting a dying person

Seven things to remember when supporting a dying person

Dr Erica Borgstrom is a medical anthropologist whose teaching and research focuses on death and dying, with a particular emphasis on end of life care. She has worked on former module K260 (Death and Dying) and will be working on the forthcoming K220 module (Death, Dying and Bereavement) in the Faculty of Wellbeing, Education and Language […]

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Wooden cross in a graveyard. Image credit: Thinkstock

The complex issues of death and dying

The only certainty in life is death. Visiting academic in Health and Social Care, Carol Komaromy, researched the complex issues of death and dying, covering topics like the place of grief in society and how people cope with death depending on their gender or profession. To mark Dying Matters Awareness Week, from 9th to 15th May, […]

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Learning lessons on coping with death from an African perspective

Learning lessons on coping with death from an African perspective

  The report, Responses to Death, Care and Family Relations in Urban Senegal, conducted by academics from the University of Reading and The Open University provides the first in-depth understanding of responses to death, care and family relations in an urban West African context. Funded by The Leverhulme Trust, the researchers suggest that Britain could […]

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Why assisted suicide is a ‘moral maze’

Why assisted suicide is a ‘moral maze’

Dr Sam Murphy, Lecturer in health studies and Interim Assistant Head of Department, in the Faculty of Health and Social Care writes on the controversial subject of assisted suicide… The recent BBC programme How to Die: Simon’s Choice brought to the fore the dilemmas that arise following a diagnosis of a terminal illness such as […]

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Simon Binner

Documentary on personal story of a choice to die

An observational documentary, co-produced by The Open University and BBC, follows the journey of a man considering assisted suicide. Simon is a successful businessman with a loving family and large circle of friends. His world falls apart in January 2015 when he is diagnosed with an aggressive form of Motor Neurone Disease and given two […]

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Musician silhouette on Stage

David Bowie: A bio-obituary

“I don’t know where I’m going from here, but I promise it won’t be boring,” said the late David Bowie back in 1997. It’s a poignant statement given his death, aged 69, this week after an 18-month battle with cancer. And the OU’s Dr Frank Monaghan says it’s as applicable to his art as it […]

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