Allan Kellehear
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 280782 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | Allan Kellehear |
| NOMBRES | Allan |
| APELLIDO | Kellehear |
| FIRMA | KELLEHEAR A |
| AFILIACIONES | University of Bath |
| ORCID | 0009-0001-5399-4075 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 33 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 6 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 32 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 1 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 1984 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 2 |
Better conversations
Death education remains unevenly embedded within higher education despite professional and civic relevance. This article presents the conceptual rationale and pedagogical design of Better Conversations, a two-week undergraduate intervention integrating public health palliative care (Kellehear), constructivist staging (Yang et al.), and life-death education frameworks (Phan et al.). Drawing on trauma-informed and culturally reflexive pedagogy, the…
Transformative Dying
Too often we think about dying as the last illness before death. However, the deeper meaning behind dying is not found in its physicality but rather its power to transform our identity. The nature of that transformative encounter with death has changed dramatically across human history. The tests, trials, and altered perceptions expected after our death, now largely occur before it
Questioning risk and vulnerability in end-of-life research
This essay provides a critical assessment on the range of common prejudices and pitfalls that should be considered when first developing research into death, dying, and end-of-life care as well as conducting ethical assessments of this work. Risk and vulnerability are commonly exaggerated or distorted in these fields. The reasons for this are discussed in terms of an unchecked problem-based gaze, a lack of recognition of the pluralism within popu…
Dying and anti-dying
This theoretical paper describes a classification with accompanying analysis of the main forms of social conduct at the end of life that goes beyond our usual understanding of sociological characterisations of dying. A taxonomy of end-of-life conduct is presented that illustrates and categorises past and contemporary sociological studies of end-of-life conduct and experiences. The categories include embodiment-led dying, systems-led dying, critic…
The Qualitative Dignispace Study
Background: Young people with life-limiting conditions have unmet psycho-spiritual needs. Dignity Therapy is a psycho-therapeutic end-of-life intervention that addresses life review, meaning making and legacy leaving. Studies of Dignity Therapy including young people are limited. Aim: To co-design a digital Dignity Therapy-based intervention for young people with life-limiting conditions (DIGNISPACE). Design: A qualitative study including focus g…
Report of the Lancet Commission on the Value of Death
What sources of bereavement support are perceived helpful by bereaved people and why? Empirical evidence for the compassionate communities approach
AIMS: To determine who provides bereavement support in the community, what sources are perceived to be the most or least helpful and for what reason, and to identify the empirical elements for optimal support in developing any future compassionate communities approach in palliative care. DESIGN: A population-based cross-sectional investigation of bereavement experiences. Sources of support (informal, community and professional) were categorised a…
Religion in Public Health‐Care Institutions
In this article, we consider the role that religion plays in the health‐care institutions of the United States and the United Kingdom. Religion has played a significant role in the development of health‐care institutions in both countries and continues to be present in them in important ways. To capture the range of involvement of religious groups in various sectors of the health‐care institution, we propose a continuum for their relationship, fr…
Compassionate Communities
A Call to Action
The current systems of care for dying persons, the people caring for them, and the bereaved operate in ways that frequently lack sufficient sensitivity to their needs. We describe a new model for dying, death, and loss that adopts a public health approach. Specifically, we describe a deliberative process that resulted in a charter for a public health approach to dying, death, and loss. Modeled after the World Health Organization's 1986 Ottawa Cha…
Is “Healthy Dying” a Paradox? Revisiting an Early Kastenbaum Challenge
This article is a review of Robert Kastenbaum's 1979 essay entitled "Healthy dying: A paradoxical quest continues." It begins with a summary of the arguments and challenges in the original essay. This is followed by an evaluation of his original claims in the light of contemporary insights in modern public health history and empirical studies of near-death experiences and death bed visions. The recent development of health promotion in palliative…
Compassionate communities
In early 2013, an online survey of over 200 UK palliative care services published in the British Medical Journal found that most of these services were prioritizing 'community engagement' initiatives, most commonly adopting a 'compassionate community' model. Later this same year, a report released by the National Council for Palliative Care and the charity Murray Hall Community Trust, described the increasing uptake of compassionate communities b…
Vigils for the Dying
This article argues that vigils for the dying owe their origins to traditional wake behavior. By viewing vigils for the dying as wake behavior, the different social conduct observed around vigils for the dying can be viewed more systematically and predictably. Vigils represent so much more than ways to manage loss and grief or to shore up support at a difficult time for the dying and their families. Vigils help establish the reality of death, pro…
Deathbed Visions from the Republic of Moldova
This is an interview-based study of 102 families and their observations of the last weeks and days of a dying family member. Forty-one families reported hearing about "visions," "hallucinations," or "dreams" from their dying loved one before their death. Of these 41 mixed cases, 37 cases demonstrated classic features of deathbed visions-reports of seeing dead relatives or friends communicating to the dying person. This article reports a content a…
Tales of Lights and Shadows
Bereavement care for the non-bereaved
This article outlines key approaches for a health promoting approach to end-of-life care. Although direct service provision for end-of-life care and bereavement are crucial to any public health approach to dying, death and loss, a broader public health approach – one that targets people in good health and outside acute episodes of need – is also vital to building a community's capacity for resilience and self-care. The approaches described in thi…
Deathbed Visions from India
This is an interview-based study of 104 families and their observations of the last weeks and days of a dying family member. Forty families reported "unusual experiences and behaviors" from the dying person in their last period of life. Thirty of these dying persons displayed behavior consistent with deathbed visions-interacting or speaking with deceased relatives, mostly their dead parents. There were six cases of reported premonitions of death …
Dementia and dying
In November 2006 a joint National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) and Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) guideline to improve the care of people with dementia was released. This influential policy document reflects both a medicalized approach to care (emphasizing pharmacological management and health services) as well as one characterized by professional dominance (an emphasis on professional authority and control). D…
Health-promoting palliative care
Although the development and spread of health-promoting palliative care is well known in Australia, as a form of community support facilitated by palliative care services, little is known about its actual practice outside that country. This article summarizes the main rationale and concepts of health-promoting palliative care, lists some of the key policy and academic writing on the subject, and provides one example of its practice. Health-promot…
Dying as a social relationship
A Social History of Dying
Our experiences of dying have been shaped by ancient ideas about death and social responsibility at the end of life. From Stone Age ideas about dying as otherworld journey to the contemporary Cosmopolitan Age of dying in nursing homes, Allan Kellehear takes the reader on a 2 million year journey of discovery that covers the major challenges we will all eventually face: anticipating, preparing, taming and timing for our eventual deaths. This book,…
The end of death in late modernity
Health promotion discourses often assume that death and loss are someone else's business—usually palliative care or bereavement care. Palliative care and bereavement care, in their turn, provide direct service, acute care approaches to death and loss. Between these two approaches, little health promotion is evidenced. This paper critiques the assumptions both make about death in late modernity arguing that death and loss are increasingly social e…
Alvarez and the Divisive God
The savage God: A study of suicide A. ALVAREZ New York: Bantam, 1970 Anyone working as a social science academic will notice the ongoing tension between the professions and the social sciences. Eve
Health-promoting palliative care
It is a common misunderstanding that health promotion and palliative care are opposite initiatives when, in fact, they can and should enjoy a complementary relationship. This paper discusses the core ideals of health promotion and outlines the nature and shape of these as they might appear in palliative care practice. The work of the health-promoting palliative care unit at La Trobe University is provided as an example of this public health pract…
The Unknown Country
The near-death experience as status passage
Religion in Public Health‐Care Institutions
In this article, we consider the role that religion plays in the health‐care institutions of the United States and the United Kingdom. Religion has played a significant role in the development of health‐care institutions in both countries and continues to be present in them in important ways. To capture the range of involvement of religious groups in various sectors of the health‐care institution, we propose a continuum for their relationship, fr…
The Sociology of Death and Dying
This paper reviews the main sociological responses to death and dying by overviewing the central literature in the area known as the 'Sociology of Death'. The main findings and arguments are outlined and analysed in three sections which cover the Anthropology of Death, the Sociology of Death and the Sociology of Dying. Criticism is summarised at the end of the paper and a suggestion is offered for future work in the area. It is concluded that an …
Are we a ‘death-denying’ society? A sociological review
The Sociology of Death and Dying
This paper reviews the main sociological responses to death and dying by overviewing the central literature in the area known as the 'Sociology of Death'. The main findings and arguments are outlined and analysed in three sections which cover the Anthropology of Death, the Sociology of Death and the Sociology of Dying. Criticism is summarised at the end of the paper and a suggestion is offered for future work in the area. It is concluded that an …
Farewells by the Dying
This article presents a sociological description and analysis of farewell conduct in an Australian sample of 100 terminally ill cancer patients. Farewells already made before the research interviews and those that were desired and planned are outlined. Sociological functions which can be surmised from this conduct are discussed. The decision not to farewell and the reasons underlying this choice are examined. Eighty-one percent of the respondents…
The Stigma of Dying
The professional literature examining social aspects of dying indicates that dying of cancer will attract negative and rejecting attitudes from others. This paper explores this theme by discussing findings from a study in which people with terminal illness were interviewed about their views of other peoples' reactions to them. Contrary to expectation, most of the respondents reported either no change, or positive changes, in their relationship wi…
The near-death experience as status passage
Health locus of control beliefs and attitudes toward people with Aids
We report the relationships between health locus of control beliefs and attitudes toward people with AIDS. Respondents were 359 adult Australians (18 years to 75 years of age). Generally, negative attitudes were associated with the view that the respondents' own health status was affected by powerful others (e.g., doctors) and chance factors. Belief in the influence of powerful others, however, only appeared to be a significant factor in the atti…
Good Days, Bad Days
Lassie Come Home
This is a report of a qualitative, content analysis of 100 “Lost Pet” notices. The aim of the study was to identify what literary techniques people employed to express their loss given a highly diverse public that may, or many not, be sympathetic to expressions of grief over pets. Four notice types were identified: The simple public notice [impersonal] (20%); the simple public notice [personalized] (55%); the personal appeal notice (21%) and; the…
Health-promoting palliative care
It is a common misunderstanding that health promotion and palliative care are opposite initiatives when, in fact, they can and should enjoy a complementary relationship. This paper discusses the core ideals of health promotion and outlines the nature and shape of these as they might appear in palliative care practice. The work of the health-promoting palliative care unit at La Trobe University is provided as an example of this public health pract…
The Unknown Country
Alvarez and the Divisive God
The savage God: A study of suicide A. ALVAREZ New York: Bantam, 1970 Anyone working as a social science academic will notice the ongoing tension between the professions and the social sciences. Eve
A Social History of Dying
Our experiences of dying have been shaped by ancient ideas about death and social responsibility at the end of life. From Stone Age ideas about dying as otherworld journey to the contemporary Cosmopolitan Age of dying in nursing homes, Allan Kellehear takes the reader on a 2 million year journey of discovery that covers the major challenges we will all eventually face: anticipating, preparing, taming and timing for our eventual deaths. This book,…
The end of death in late modernity
Health promotion discourses often assume that death and loss are someone else's business—usually palliative care or bereavement care. Palliative care and bereavement care, in their turn, provide direct service, acute care approaches to death and loss. Between these two approaches, little health promotion is evidenced. This paper critiques the assumptions both make about death in late modernity arguing that death and loss are increasingly social e…
Health-promoting palliative care
Although the development and spread of health-promoting palliative care is well known in Australia, as a form of community support facilitated by palliative care services, little is known about its actual practice outside that country. This article summarizes the main rationale and concepts of health-promoting palliative care, lists some of the key policy and academic writing on the subject, and provides one example of its practice. Health-promot…
Dying as a social relationship
Dementia and dying
In November 2006 a joint National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) and Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) guideline to improve the care of people with dementia was released. This influential policy document reflects both a medicalized approach to care (emphasizing pharmacological management and health services) as well as one characterized by professional dominance (an emphasis on professional authority and control). D…
Bereavement care for the non-bereaved
This article outlines key approaches for a health promoting approach to end-of-life care. Although direct service provision for end-of-life care and bereavement are crucial to any public health approach to dying, death and loss, a broader public health approach – one that targets people in good health and outside acute episodes of need – is also vital to building a community's capacity for resilience and self-care. The approaches described in thi…
Deathbed Visions from India
This is an interview-based study of 104 families and their observations of the last weeks and days of a dying family member. Forty families reported "unusual experiences and behaviors" from the dying person in their last period of life. Thirty of these dying persons displayed behavior consistent with deathbed visions-interacting or speaking with deceased relatives, mostly their dead parents. There were six cases of reported premonitions of death …
Deathbed Visions from the Republic of Moldova
This is an interview-based study of 102 families and their observations of the last weeks and days of a dying family member. Forty-one families reported hearing about "visions," "hallucinations," or "dreams" from their dying loved one before their death. Of these 41 mixed cases, 37 cases demonstrated classic features of deathbed visions-reports of seeing dead relatives or friends communicating to the dying person. This article reports a content a…
Tales of Lights and Shadows
Compassionate communities
In early 2013, an online survey of over 200 UK palliative care services published in the British Medical Journal found that most of these services were prioritizing 'community engagement' initiatives, most commonly adopting a 'compassionate community' model. Later this same year, a report released by the National Council for Palliative Care and the charity Murray Hall Community Trust, described the increasing uptake of compassionate communities b…
Vigils for the Dying
This article argues that vigils for the dying owe their origins to traditional wake behavior. By viewing vigils for the dying as wake behavior, the different social conduct observed around vigils for the dying can be viewed more systematically and predictably. Vigils represent so much more than ways to manage loss and grief or to shore up support at a difficult time for the dying and their families. Vigils help establish the reality of death, pro…
A Call to Action
The current systems of care for dying persons, the people caring for them, and the bereaved operate in ways that frequently lack sufficient sensitivity to their needs. We describe a new model for dying, death, and loss that adopts a public health approach. Specifically, we describe a deliberative process that resulted in a charter for a public health approach to dying, death, and loss. Modeled after the World Health Organization's 1986 Ottawa Cha…
Is “Healthy Dying” a Paradox? Revisiting an Early Kastenbaum Challenge
This article is a review of Robert Kastenbaum's 1979 essay entitled "Healthy dying: A paradoxical quest continues." It begins with a summary of the arguments and challenges in the original essay. This is followed by an evaluation of his original claims in the light of contemporary insights in modern public health history and empirical studies of near-death experiences and death bed visions. The recent development of health promotion in palliative…
Compassionate Communities
Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health (22 obras) · Medicine (20 obras) · Political science (19 obras) · Sociology (19 obras) · Palliative Care and End-of-Life Issues (16 obras) · Law (15 obras) · Nursing (15 obras) · Psychology (15 obras) · Palliative care (11 obras) · Social science (11 obras)