HHS HealthBeat (March 27, 2009)

Teens and Talk about Dying

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I’m Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.

It’s difficult enough to have a family discussion about a family member dying. Think about how it must be when a teenager is the person facing the possibility of death.

But researchers say a discussion – with expert guidance – about the teen’s wishes could be very worthwhile.

Maureen Lyon of Children’s National Medical Center of Washington compared families that had guided discussions and families that did not.

In both cases, she says, teens trusted parents to carry out their wishes. But she says there was something missing in families that did not have the discussions:

[Maureen Lyon speaks] "Although those adolescents did say they wanted to trust their families’ judgment, knowing what their wishes were, in fact they did not know what their adolescent’s wishes were."

The study in the journal Pediatrics was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Learn more at hhs.gov.

HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I’m Ira Dreyfuss.

Last revised: March, 30 2009