Influencia de las emociones en el juicio clínico de los profesionales de la salud a propósito del diagnóstico de enfermedad terminal

In Spain, the dying process is sometimes described as «bad» or even «awful». There are many reasons for this situation, the most important being the difficulties health care professionals have to face with death and their lack of ability to help and assist patients to go through the dying process. The influence of the current cultural context regarding death and the way people die is paired with other factors. These factors are both clinical and professional in nature such as for example: the moment of diagnosis of a terminally ill patient that entails important emotional implications for the health care professionals, the patient and their family. All these factors have a direct influence on the health care assistance. We conducted Grounded Theory-based, phenomenological, qualitative research using a final sample of 42 indepth interviews with doctors and nurses from different fields in Granada (Spain) in order to understand their point of view, as health care providers, on the assistance given to terminally ill patients. The results were analysed with Atlas-tí software using thematic coding. The results show the effect the emotional factor has on the clinical judgment of health care professionals and support the need for broader and more comprehensive study. KEYWORDS. Emotions. Terminally ill. End of life processes. Health care professionals. Qualitative study