Lisbet Lindholm

The face of suffering among women with breast cancer - being in a field of forces

Through qualitative interviews, the suffering experiences of women with breast cancer and their significant others were disclosed. Seventeen women with different stages of breast cancer and 16 significant others from 4 different care cultures in Sweden and Finland participated. Five of the women had advanced metastatic breast cancer, and 12 had a localized disease. Mean age was 48 years. As a methodology, a team approach, inspired by the Vancouver School of Doing Phenomenology, was used. The findings elucidate how the suffering experience touched the women’s inner existence and values. This can metaphorically be described as a “field of force” and affected everything in the women’s lives, including their views of themselves and their relationships. Existential questions were raised about life and death and the meaning of life. In their suffering, the women’s dependency upon significant others, as well as healthcare personnel, was prominent. Suffering related to healthcare was a strong theme. Different faces of suffering related to breast cancer may still be unknown by healthcare professionals working in cancer care.

Clinical Application Research: A Hermeneutical Approach to the Appropriation of Caring Science

Clinical caring science researchers contribute, by means of various participatory research efforts, to bring clinical practice closer to the ideals of caring. These research efforts have in the main been developed from classical action research rooted in critical theory. In this article, the authors launch an alternative research approach called clinical application research, the basis of which can be traced to the interpretative paradigm, or hermeneutics. The basic cornerstones of this research approach are ontology, context, and appropriation as well as understanding, interpretation, and application. Using an example from ongoing clinical research, the authors demonstrate the utility of this approach. Their aim in this article is to contribute to the development of methods within clinical research.

The Dialectic of Health and Suffering: An Ontological Perspective on Young People's Health

This studys aim is to understand the health of young people (ages 13 to 19) from an ontological perspective. The authors take an abductive research approach to understand the experience of health. Fifteen interviews are analyzed and interpreted by a hermneneutic method. From the viewpoint of the young, health is a process of becoming, which can be identified as a dialectic alternation between opposites: the experiences of having and not having something valuable, of being and not being somebody, and of becoming and not becoming an integral human being. Health as a dialectic alternation presupposes awareness, freedom, and different forms of strengths. Awareness of suffering gives depth to health. In the ontological sense, health and suffering reflect the dialectic between good and evil and between life and death.

Hope and Hopelessness – Nourishment for the Patient’s Vitality

The purpose of this inquiry was to increase the understanding of the significance of hope and hopelessness for patients’ vitality. Fifty women suffering from breast cancer have contributed their stories. The stories were submitted to an analysis of content and were interpreted within the framework of Eriksson’s theory. The findings show that hope and hopelessness succeed each other in a borderland situation of threatening death. The threat of death opens up the possibility of receiving hope. Communion with others and meaning in life are the sources of hope that provide strength to live and to endure hopelessness. Hope and hopelessness presuppose each other and stimulate vitality, the core substance of health.

Drama as a new rehabilitation possibility for women afflicted with breast cancer.

The aim of this qualitative longitudinal study was to evaluate drama as a method within the rehabilitation of women afflicted with breast cancer. By purposeful sampling, 11 of a total of 20 women participated in the study and were interviewed 3 times over 9 months. The interviews were transcribed. The data analysis was an inductive latent content analysis. The results show that the women felt that their lives were out of balance before the drama exercises; the female and physical dimension was emphasized. During the drama exercises, it became apparent that breast cancer was a unifying factor; the women were able to share difficult experiences with each other. After the drama group, it appeared that the womens joy of living had returned, as well as better self-confidence, inner peace, and feelings of good health. During group meetings, the women experienced drama, support, and solidarity within a closed group. Important events in their lives were revealed, and the women were given an opportunity to confront their hidden thoughts and feelings and to express them. All the women felt support and solidarity within the group as well as a personal development. Drama can be seen as a suitable rehabilitation method for women with breast cancer.

Virtue and Health – Describing Virtue as a Path to the Inner Domain of Health

The aim of the study is to investigate the meaning that virtues have for human health and to develop a health-promoting model describing virtue as a path to the inner domain of health. The concept of virtue, in accordance with Aristotle’s theory of virtue, is used as the frame for interpretation. This investigation comprises an empirical study that avails itself of the Delphi method to collect data. The expert panel consisted of 10 experts in the field of nursing care. Abduction is the method that is used. The result is presented at four levels of interpretation and the final finding constitutes four theses, which comprise the virtues of wisdom, faith, courage, and love and a conceptual model.