Phenomenological qualitative research that used Heidegger's hermeneutics, with the aim to understand the meaning of finiteness for nursing students when experiencing death. Data were collected between March and May of 2011, by means of interviews with eight nursing students from the Federal University of Santa Catarina. The audio of the phenomenological interviews was recorded and later transcribed. Data were analyzed as per the stages of pre-understanding, understanding, and interpretation of what the participants said, and the following units of meaning emerged: Temporality and existence as a prerogative of the academic being, The experience of death: when a loved one passes away, and Disease as a possibility of being-toward-death. Nursing students view themselves to be temporarily inserted in the world and are aware that they are a being-toward-death when reflecting on death, and their constant return to fundamental questions of their being, configuring themselves as the basis of their entire interpretation about life and living.
Nursing students; Family relations; Death; Nursing philosophy