Meanings and experiential outcomes of bodily care in a specialist palliative context
2015 (English)In: Palliative & Supportive Care, ISSN 1478-9515, E-ISSN 1478-9523, Vol. 13, no 3, p. 625-633Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]
Objective: The objective of this study was to enhance the depth of existing knowledge about meanings and experiential outcomes of bodily care in the context of an inpatient specialist palliative setting.
Method: Interpretative phenomenology was chosen as the study sought to explore individuals' lived experiences related to bodily care. Nine participants (five women, four men) of various ages and with various metastasized cancers and bodily-care needs, all from one specialist palliative care ward, participated. Data were collected with repeated narrative interviews and supplementary participating observations. Analysis was informed by van Manen's approach.
Results: The following meanings and experiential outcomes of bodily care were revealed by our study: maintaining and losing body capability, breaching borders of bodily integrity, being comforted and relieved in bodily-care situations, and being left in distress with unmet needs. These meanings overlap and shape the nature of each other and involve comforting and distressing experiences related to what can be described as conditional dimensions: the particular situation, one's own experiences of the body, and healthcare professionals' approaches.
Significance of results: The results, based on specialist palliative care patients' experiences, outline the meanings and outcomes that relate to the quintessence and complexity of palliative care, deriving from dying persons' blend of both basic and symptom-oriented bodily-care needs. Moreover, the results outline how these two dimensions of care equally influence whether comfort and well-being are facilitated or not. Considering this, specialist palliative care may consider how to best integrate and acknowledge the value of skilled basic nursing care as part of and complementary to expertise in symptom relief during the trajectories of illness and dying.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2015. Vol. 13, no 3, p. 625-633
Keywords [en]
Bodily care, Body decline, Interpretive phenomenology, Nursing care, Palliative care
National Category
Nursing
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:esh:diva-4145DOI: 10.1017/S147895151400025XPubMedID: 24762673OAI: oai:DiVA.org:esh-4145DiVA, id: diva2:757711
Note
Funding: Erling Persson Foundation, Sven and Dagmar Sahlén Foundation, OE and Edla Johansson Scientific Foundation, Olle Engkvist Foundation
2014-10-232014-10-232021-04-06Bibliographically approved