[Ethical issues surrounding death in pre-hospital medicine]

Abstract

Mobile emergency and resuscitation teams are confronted with death on a daily basis. In the home, the management of a death is complex. It raises ethical questions and sometimes destabilizes personal or collective values. Our single-center qualitative survey, conducted over a one-month period (2022), questioned 64/154 caregivers about the moral burden and challenges of such situations. The consequences of operational experience are discussed: time, fatigue, emotions and training. The quality of presence is an alternative to the success or failure of cardiac arrest care at home.

Keywords: caregiver; death; emergency; ethics; infirmier; mort; nurse; prehospital; préhospitalier; soignant; urgence; éthique.