Healthcare professionals encounter grief every day.
Whether supporting a patient following the death of a loved one, speaking with family members, delivering difficult news, or caring for those living with life-limiting illness, conversations about loss are a routine yet often challenging part of healthcare.
Recently, The Loss Foundation delivered Grief Awareness Training to a group of NHS primary care practices, bringing together GPs and healthcare professionals from five surgeries to explore how we can better support others through bereavement while also looking after ourselves in the process.
Why Bereavement Training Matters in Primary Care
For many people, their GP practice is one of the first places they turn following a bereavement.
Patients may seek help for low mood, anxiety, sleep difficulties, physical symptoms, relationship challenges, or simply because they need somebody to talk to. Yet grief itself is not a mental health disorder. It is a natural response to loss that can affect people emotionally, physically, cognitively and behaviourally.
Healthcare professionals are therefore faced with an important challenge: how do we recognise and validate grief without pathologising it?
The training explored this question alongside the many ways grief can present in clinical settings.
Understanding the Many Faces of Grief
One of the key messages throughout the session was that grief is highly individual.
People may experience sadness, anxiety, guilt, anger, loneliness, difficulty concentrating, disrupted sleep, physical symptoms, changes in appetite, social withdrawal, existential concerns and many other reactions following a loss.
The circumstances of the death, the relationship with the person who died, cultural influences, social support networks, physical health and personal beliefs can all shape how somebody experiences bereavement.
This understanding is particularly important in primary care, where professionals often meet people at very different stages of their grief journey.
Moving Beyond the Five Stages
The training introduced several grief models commonly used within bereavement support, including the Five Stages Model, the Dual Process Model and the Growing Around Grief Model.
Particular attention was given to the Dual Process Model, which recognises that people naturally move between confronting their loss and engaging with everyday life. Rather than viewing grief as a linear process, the model highlights the normal oscillation between loss-oriented and restoration-oriented coping.
For healthcare professionals, this can provide a useful framework for understanding why a patient may appear to be coping well one week and struggling the next.
Supporting Patients Through Difficult Conversations
Many professionals worry about saying the wrong thing.
A recurring theme throughout the training was that supporting someone in grief is often less about finding the perfect words and more about being present, listening carefully and validating their experience.
Participants explored practical communication skills including:
- Active listening
- Reflection and acknowledgement
- Validation of thoughts and feelings
- Empathic responses
- Making space for emotion
- Avoiding common conversational blockers and platitudes
One phrase from the training particularly resonated:
“Grief is to be witnessed, not fixed.”
For many healthcare professionals, this can be a powerful shift. In a profession centred around solving problems and improving outcomes, grief can feel uncomfortable precisely because it cannot be fixed. Yet acknowledging somebody’s loss and responding with compassion can be enormously meaningful.
Looking After Ourselves Too
Supporting others through grief can be emotionally demanding.
The session therefore included a significant focus on practitioner wellbeing and resilience. Participants explored common warning signs of emotional overload, including fatigue, low mood, anxiety, difficulty concentrating and sleep disruption.
We discussed practical self-care strategies, the importance of recognising personal limits, and the role of self-compassion when working with distressing situations.
Because effective bereavement support starts not only with caring for others, but also with caring for ourselves.
A Growing Need for Grief Awareness
Bereavement is something every healthcare professional will encounter, yet many receive little formal training in how to respond confidently and compassionately.
Through our Grief Awareness Training, The Loss Foundation helps healthcare teams build practical skills, deepen their understanding of grief, and develop confidence in having some of life’s most difficult conversations.
By improving grief awareness across healthcare settings, we can help ensure that fewer people feel alone in their loss and that more professionals feel equipped to offer meaningful support when it matters most.
To find out more about our bereavement training for healthcare organisations, charities and workplaces, please get in touch.
Feedback from the Session
The training prompted thoughtful discussion amongst participants about the realities of supporting patients through loss and the challenges that can arise when grief presents in healthcare settings.
Feedback highlighted the value of gaining a broader understanding of grief, exploring practical communication skills, and having space to reflect on the emotional impact that supporting bereaved patients can have on healthcare professionals themselves.
Participants particularly valued the session’s emphasis on validation, active listening, and the reminder that grief is not something to be fixed, but something to be acknowledged and witnessed. Many reflected that the training helped increase their confidence in having bereavement conversations and provided practical tools they could apply in their day-to-day work with patients.
As one participant commented:
“The session helped me feel more confident in supporting people who are grieving and reminded me that sometimes simply listening and acknowledging a person’s loss can make a significant difference.”
The discussion also reinforced something we see time and time again in our training: healthcare professionals care deeply about supporting bereaved patients well. Often, what they need is not more expertise, but greater confidence in using the empathy, compassion and communication skills they already possess.
