Tempus fugit. It is now 10 years exactly since the first post appeared on this blog, setting out a new agenda for social science research at the University of Glasgow. The decade milestone brings a good moment for a little reflection, and also for a look forward. In March 2014, I’d just had confirmation of success… Continue reading
Cicely Saunders died on 14th July 2005. I was running an international end of life care summer school at Lancaster University at the time. That evening, staff and students gathered in the home of a colleague: the summer school party had turned into a wake. I read out a draft of an obituary I had… Continue reading
TS Eliot’s chilling start to The Waste Land has deep resonance in the time of COVID-19. We seem to be exactly in that instant when ‘the dead tree gives no shelter’, when ‘I was neither living nor dead’, and when ‘He who was living is now dead’[i]. The mere 30 days of April have felt… Continue reading
Professor David Clark, Dr Marian Krawzyck, Dr Naomi Richards, Dr Sandy Whitelaw, Anthony Bell – all members of the Glasgow End of Life Studies Group – share some recent insights. ‘Palliative care will assume a central and vital role in the care for patients in an influenza pandemic’ (Rosoff 2006) [1] The importance of delivering… Continue reading
When in February 2014, I heard the news that my application for a Wellcome Trust Investigator Award had been successful, I could scarcely have imagined what would follow over the next six years. The Trust is perhaps unique among funders in the incredible extent to which it gives grantees the scope and encouragement to think… Continue reading
Autumn 2019 saw a team of us in the Glasgow End of Life Studies Group set out into unknown educational waters. Over a three-week period, we delivered a free online course called End of Life Care – Challenges and Innovation. We possibly didn’t anticipate how long our preparations and course building would take. We probably… Continue reading
The close of 2019 sees the publication of the latest world map of palliative care development. Drawing on data from 198 countries in 2017, the full paper is available on open access and can be found here. Despite the many challenges in its production, and the views of some detractors in the field, I believe… Continue reading
It is with huge pleasure this month that we embark upon a truly global initiative within our team – a new programme of online learning in end of life studies. In our research group at the University of Glasgow we feel we belong to a worldwide community of people with a shared interest in questions… Continue reading
