Ethnically Diverse Faith Perspectives on Death Literacy and End-of-Life Care
This community-based participatory research project explores death literacy and end-of-life care across Birmingham's Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish and Sikh communities. Funded by Research England, it is led by the Centre for the Art of Living and Dying Well with the Royal Marsden, the Archdiocese of Birmingham, Lancaster University Medical School and Public Health Wales.
Birmingham is one of Europe's most diverse cities, home to more than 340,000 Muslims alongside significant Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish and Sikh populations. Despite this, these communities remain significantly underserved in end-of-life care. The project was co-created with a Community Advisory Group drawn from Birmingham's faith communities, with focus groups involving faith leaders, community workers and faith members.
The research addresses three main areas:
- what matters most at the end of life across faith traditions
- the barriers faith communities encounter in hospitals and healthcare settings
- practical recommendations for healthcare providers and faith organisations.
It responds directly to the healthcare inequalities identified in Lord Darzi's Independent Investigation of the National Health Service in England (2024). Findings have already influenced public health policy and practice in Sandwell, and the work is now being extended to London in partnership with the Royal Marsden.
What the research found
Certain practices matter across all the traditions studied: sacred texts and prayers, the significance of holy water at the moment of death, the placement of the body before and after death, and post-death rituals that differ substantially between faiths.
The research also identified consistent barriers in healthcare settings, including wards too noisy for prayer and ritual, insufficient space for families to gather at the bedside, delays in obtaining death certificates and releasing bodies for burial, concerns about autopsy where religions discourage it, and bodies being handled in ways that conflict with religious requirements.
Communities are already building death literacy in their own settings – through well-attended workshops, conversations about organ donation, teaching members to wash and prepare bodies, and death committees that pool resources to support grieving families.
Recommendations for healthcare settings
- invite community members to teach staff about religious rituals
- create better spaces for families and for prayer
- speed up death certification and the release of bodies
- invite healthcare workers to visit places of worship to understand death rituals.
Recognition
The project's poster was awarded Joint Runner-Up for the Joanna Mugridge Prize at the Marie Curie Research into Practice Conference 2026, with judges praising its accessibility and its actionable recommendations.
The research was also presented at the national celebration of the 60th anniversary of Nostra Aetate at St Chad's Cathedral, Birmingham, in a panel discussion moderated by Associate Professor Maggie Doherty.
Contact us
To contact the project's team, please email Maggie Doherty .