ABSTRACT
In classroom situations some preliminary operations are necessary. After discussion of the eroding effects of illness on the lives of patients, students are asked to imagine they have recently been told that they themselves have a potentially fatal disease such as leukemia. Additionally, of course, each student is asked to complete the tasks spelled out in the self-instructional unit. The anonymous cross-sectional autobiographies are then redistributed to the class. Each student receives an autobiography from an unidentified fellow student of the same sex. Going through the experience of dying is likely to cause people quite a lot of trouble, inconvenience, and worry. Patients, like the rest of us folks, are about as likely to be concerned about one important thing as they are another. Some issues like pain, finances or plans to see that their children are cared for, can become part of people problem list to be solved.
