Background:

Personal and clinical experiences influence how nursing students cope with death.

Objective:

To assess nursing students’ attitudes towards death and end-of-life care.

Methods:

Descriptive study. Data were collected through an online questionnaire. The sample consisted of 158 undergraduate nursing students. Quantitative data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics software. Descriptive statistics and exploratory data analysis were performed through parametric and non-parametric tests.

Results: Students tend more to attitudes of neutral acceptance, fear of death, and approach acceptance and less to attitudes of avoidance and escape. Regarding end-of-life care, students who had already completed clinical training showed positive attitudes.

Conclusion:

Teaching and learning methodologies should be used to allow students to expose their experiences with death and end-of-life care in clinical training.

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