Abstract
The practice of congenital heart disease（CHD）is a field in which we often have to face death. In the past, the death was a matter of God or Buddha, but it becomes a matter of medical science through the advance of medical technology. Accordingly, we are now required to have knowledge of thanatology in order to provide terminal care as satisfactory as possible to dying patients and families. For this purpose, we have to understand the psychological sequence of dying and death. This sequence includes shock, denial, anger, depressive feelings, and others, which are considered normal reactions to protect the mind of suffering people. Knowing their psychological status, we listen to their narrative story, which often includes personal emotions and wishes, and we give support with sympathy, accordingly. By doing this, we hope that they would pass through the painful process as comfortable as possible.Children start understanding death in the first 1-3 grades of primary school, but their apparent reaction to death is much different from that of adults. We have to watch carefully those children who are facing dying or death and give warm and continuous support.Now, the number of adult CHD（ACHD）patients and mortality is increasing. Their deaths are a major issue of thanatology and cause grief of parents and/or adult siblings of the ACHD patient, family, wife, and children of the ACHD patient, if any. We now have to start to prepare for this new very serious problem.
