PP304 Topic: AS05–End of Life: Palliative Care/Organ Donation/Ethics/Spirituality & Wellness/Other: EMOTION MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES UTILIZED BY CANADIAN PEDIATRIC INTENSIVE CARE UNIT INTERPROFESSIONAL CLINICIANS CARING FOR CHILDREN AT THE END OF LIFE: AN EXPLORATORY QUALITATIVE STUDY

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Aims & Objectives: Caring for children at end of life is a reality of practice in the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU). Learning how to make sense of death at work is necessary for all PICU professionals. This study examined the emotional experiences of work exposure to death from the perspective of interprofessional clinicians. Methods: This exploratory, semi-structured interview study of interprofessional clinicians working in Canadian PICUs was grounded in interpretive phenomenology. We recruited clinicians through an intake form circulated via professional networks and purposively sampled respondents for maximum variation of profession, career stage, province, and self-identification as Black, Indigenous, and/or a person of colour. Two team members independently, inductively coded interview transcripts; iterative thematic analysis was used to generate themes. Results: Fifteen PICU clinicians informed three themes identified as influential in how clinicians made sense of death at work. 1) Death context: emotional impacts varied by contextual factors (e.g., unexpected death; family reactions). 2) Perceptions of professional performance: perceived ability to do a “good” job in accordance with personal and professional values. 3) Access to resources: access to support varied (e.g., team debriefs), with physiotherapists and social workers reporting limited access. Although clinicians shared many strategies and resources for managing emotions, the ability to apply these strategies was impacted by environmental constraints (e.g., pace of work, under-staffing). Conclusions: Clinicians were emotionally impacted by exposure to death at work and encountered varied access to supports. PICU leaders should consider who may be left out of unit-level supports and advocate for organizational-level interventions to reduce environmental constraints. Keywords: qualitative, emotional labour, pediatric critical care, interprofessional team, end of life

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