[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 36 (Friday, March 25, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: March 25, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                     NATIONAL GRIEF TELECONFERENCE

  Mr. DURENBERGER. Mr. President, on March 31, over 40,000 people will 
gather at 890 sites in the United States, Puerto Rico, and Canada to 
listen, learn, and participate in a teleconference on death, grief, and 
bereavement. The event is sponsored by the nonprofit Hospice 
Foundation.
  Grief is not something you expect to attract large crowds, but this 
conference has. When the foundation began this effort, it expected to 
reach no more than 50 sites and possibly 2,000 or 3,000 people. Those 
numbers were exceeded during the first day of sign-ups.
  The extraordinary response--indeed, the demand to participate--
indicates how universal the need is for counseling for those who 
survive the death of a loved one or are caregivers for the dying on a 
daily, professional basis. This includes not only the medical 
profession, but volunteers, family members, social workers, and clergy 
who provide solace and spiritual sustenance to the grieving.
  More than 2,000,000 people die each year in the United States, 
excluding homicide, suicide, and traffic accidents. Another 170,000 
people die in those ways. Death, anticipated or sudden, leaves in its 
wake more than tears. Family, friends, fellow employees live with the 
lingering aftereffects of grief and bereavement.
  Some handle it well, but others suffer chronic or periodic 
depression, over-medication, alcohol abuse or some other dysfunctional 
behavior. Many of those who grieve need help; all of them would be well 
served by at least minimal counseling.
  Death, grief, and bereavement are conditions faced by hospice people 
every day since over 200,000 terminally ill people are cared for 
annually by hospices. Indeed, Medicare-certified hospices must, by law, 
have both social workers and clergy available for their patients and 
for a period after a death for the survivors to help with grief and 
bereavement.
  Further, Medicare requires that volunteers be involved and almost 
70,000 were last year, contributing more than 5,000,000 hours of unpaid 
service. The Hospice Foundation has, therefore, concerned itself 
increasingly with the handling of grief and bereavement by hospice 
volunteers and workers.
  In my own State of Minnesota, there will be 32 sits where over 1,000 
people will join together to learn, to share ideas and experience, and 
to enhance their skills at helping others in need of counsel and 
companionship. Those sites reach from International Falls and Hallock 
in our northernmost areas to the Waseca, Worthington, and Jackson far 
to the south. The sites are in rural areas and in our major cities, and 
the local sponsors include hospices, medical centers, VA, and other 
hospitals, community colleges, and county social service agencies.
  Our attention is often drawn to the catastrophic natural disasters 
that afflict us--spring floods, tornados in my area, but earthquakes, 
mudslides, fires elsewhere. They deserve and must have our attention, 
but it is also true that natural death goes on year after year, day 
after day, and that hospice workers devote themselves to making the 
final days of others as good as they can be. It is an important 
demonstration of compassion, concern, and involvement. Within 
Minnesota, there are well over 50 hospices at work in their 
communities. I am proud of our commitment to caring.
  I want to commend the Hospice Foundation for undertaking this project 
and to thank those who are attending for enhancing their skills through 
knowledge and insights shared by an outstanding, dedicated panel. The 
participants include moderator Cokie Roberts of ABC News, and Jack D. 
Gordon, president of the Hospice Foundation, Dr. Kenneth J. Doka, 
president of the Association of Death Education and Counseling, Dr. 
Therese A. Rando, director of the Institute for the Study and Treatment 
of Loss, Dr. Ellen S. Zinner, director of the Center for Loss and Grief 
Therapy, Dr. J. William Worden, codirector of the Child Bereavement 
Study at Harvard University, and Dr. Sandra L. Bertman, director of the 
Medical Humanities Program at the University of Massachusetts as 
panelists.

                          ____________________