title: The experience of nursing students facing death and dying.
abstract: To understand the phenomenon experienced by nursing students in their academic practices in view of death and dying.
  
  
  
  This was a qualitative study, based on Martin Heidegger' existential phenomenology, undertaken at a public University in Alagoas, Brazil, between August and October 2013. Seven senior students of nursing were interviewed.
  
  
  
  The phenomenological analysis yielded the following existential themes: Facing death and dying in academic practice; Acknowledging impotence in the face of death; Glimpsing the possibility of solicitude; Interacting with the family in view of the loss; Experiencing spirituality in the face of dying.
  
  
  
  It is deduced that, during the academic education, the theme involving death and dying has been addressed insufficiently, without precisely attending to all the demands of the nursing students during care in the dying process.
authors.affiliation: Universidade Estadual de Ciências da Saúde de Alagoas -UNCISAL-, Brazil.
authors.forename: Aline Viana
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Sampaio
authors.affiliation: UFAL, Brazil, icomassetto@usp.br.
authors.forename: Isabel
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Comassetto
authors.affiliation: Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil, rafacris@usp.br.
authors.forename: Ana Cristina Mancussi e
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Faro
authors.affiliation: UFAL.
authors.forename: Regina Maria
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Dos Santos
authors.affiliation: UFAL.
authors.forename: Fernanda Silva
authors.initials: FS
authors.lastname: Monteiro
mesh_terms: D001293:Attitude to Death; D001938:Brazil; D004506:Education, Nursing; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D013338:Students, Nursing / Q000523:psychology*