Sammanfattning Bakgrund: Övervikt och fetma är ett växande problem i Sverige och i stora delar av världen. Överviktskirurgin har ökat kraftigt de senaste åren och är idag en utbredd metod för att behandla övervikt och dess följdsjukdomar. Trots att syftet med operationen är att minska risken för ohälsa så visar studier att personer som genomgått denna typ av behandling, konsumerar mer sjukvård än personer som behandlats med andra metoder mot sin fetma. Därav är det viktigt att få en djupare förståelse för hur personer som genomgår överviktskirurgi upplever sin situation i samband med ingreppet.   Syfte: Att beskriva personers upplevelser och behov i samband med överviktskirurgi ur ett vårdvetenskapligt perspektiv. Teoretisk utgångspunkt: Transitionsteorin utifrån Meleis et. al., (2000) har använts som teoretisk referensram till denna litteraturstudie. Metod: En systematisk litteraturstudie baserad på åtta vetenskapliga artiklar med kvalitativ ansats. Resultat: Tre teman framkom: Livet före operationen, Den första tiden efter operationen och En längre tid efter operationen. Livet före operationen beskrevs som en hopplös kamp mot vikten och beslutet att operera sig som en sista utväg. Informanterna hade stora förväntningar på operationens resultat, vilka med tiden inte alltid visade sig vara realistiska. Ingreppet beskrevs dock som en mycket positiv livsförändrande händelse. Gemensamt för informanterna var att de upplevde svårigheter med att behålla en hälsosam livsstil en längre tid efter operationen, vissa lyckades med detta, andra inte. Det framkom att informanter hade negativa erfarenheter av sjukvården. Diskussion: Resultatet visar ett behov av ökade förberedelser och stöd från sjuksköterskan inför operationen. Genom att understödja det hopp om ett hälsosammare liv, som uttrycktes efter operationen, kan sjuksköterskan motivera till livsstilsförändringar och därmed främja en hälsosam transition även på längre sikt. Resultaten tyder på att det finns ett omvårdnadsbehov som kvarstår många år efter ingreppet, samt att en god vårdrelation är av stor vikt för ett lyckat behandlingsresultat. / Abstract Background: Obesity is a growing problem in Sweden and in many parts of the world. Bariatric surgery has increased dramatically in recent years and is now a widespread method to treat obesity and its sequelae. Although the purpose of the surgery is to reduce the risk of illness, studies show that patients, who have undergone this type of treatment, consume more healthcare resources than those treated with other methods to manage their obesity. It is therefore important to better understand how individuals who undergo bariatric surgery experience their situation in the context of the intervention. Purpose: To describe individual´s experiences and needs associated with bariatric surgery from a caring science perspective. Theoretical basis: Theory of Transition by Meleis et. al. (2000) has been used as a theoretical framework for this study. Methods: A systematic literature review based on eight scientific articles with qualitative approach. Results: Three themes emerged: Life before the surgery, the first period after the surgery and a longer period after surgery. Life prior to the surgery was described as losing a battle against obesity and the decision to undergo surgery was regarded as a last resort. The respondents had high expectations of the surgery results, which in time did not always prove to be realistic. The procedure was described as a very positive life changing event. It showed to be common for the respondents to experience difficulties in maintaining a healthy lifestyle for a prolonged period of time after the surgery. However, some were able to achieve this whilst others were not. It was revealed that respondents had negative experiences of health care. Discussion: The results show a need for increased preparation and support from the nurse before surgery. By supporting the hope of a healthier life, as expressed after the surgery, the nurse can motivate lifestyle changes and thus promote a healthy transition in the longer term. The results suggest that there is a need for nursing care that persists for years after the procedure, and that a good care relationship is vital for a successful treatment outcome.

The growing complexities and dramatic changes in the contemporary health care system require nurses to practice successfully with essential professional knowledge and skills required for safe and competent practice. The implication is that nurse educators are confronted with the challenge to redefine effective teaching strategies appropriate to prepare nurses for the complexities of the current practice demands. To this end, student-centered teaching (SCT) has emerged in many undergraduate nursing curricula as a tool to develop essential practice skills in nursing students. A lack of understanding of how nurse educators experience SCT may hinder its success and sustainability. This qualitative study explored the lived experience of clinical nurse educators (CNEs) using SCT in the practice settings. Ten CNEs who self-identified as using SCT volunteered to participate. Data were collected using a semi-structured interview guide and audio recorder. Additional data source included a demographic survey and a reflective journal. Analysis of the CNEs’ perspectives revealed an overarching theme entitled “SCT in a non-student-centered world” with a variety of meanings of SCT from a humanistic point of view. Participants identified individual, staff, and contextual factors including policy issues that hinder successful implementation of SCT in the practice settings. The study also unveiled that a successful paradigm shift to SCT may not be the sole responsibility of the CNEs but a joint endeavor by all stake-holders within the health care delivery system. Findings of this study may be used by nursing and health sciences faculty and administrators to guide policy and program planning that incorporates student-centered clinical education. / October 2016

Background: Although there is significant scholarly interest in defining the concept of successful aging, there are very few small-scale, in-depth qualitative studies examining the lived experience of women over 80 who self-identify as aging successfully. Aim: The aim of this study is to explore the lived experience of a small group of community-dwelling Jewish women over 80 in a single county in Northwestern Vermont who self-identify as aging successfully. Approach: This study has a phenomenological approach. Method: Phenomenological interviews were conducted with five women over 80 years of age. Interview content was analyzed, and shared themes were synthesized. Findings: Findings revealed the following shared themes: acknowledgement of extraordinary quality of life events and/or circumstances, extensive and ongoing social involvement with communities and/or individuals, and strong sense of self. Conclusions: The lived experiences of participants who self-identified as aging successfully were characterized by gratitude for the lives they led and continue to lead, extensive and ongoing communal and interpersonal social engagement, and high levels of self-esteem and self-knowledge. Implications for practice: Interventions focused on promoting gratitude, ongoing social engagement, and self-esteem/efficacy may improve individuals' chances of aging successfully; women over 80 respond positively given the opportunity to tell their story, and may benefit from affiliation with a religious community.

<p>I investigate how Baruch de Spinoza and Friedrich Nietzsche conceive of difference as bearing a distinctive normative significance for modern social and political life. Both Spinoza and Nietzsche ascribe special importance to the difference embodied by exceptional individuals, and to the attitudes towards difference that such individuals avow when they interact or cooperate with other individuals in society. I then reanimate this neglected aspect of their writings in my own constructive proposal. In particular, I argue that by inhabiting and harnessing our differences, we can realise new yet unknown possibilities that make for deep and meaningful social change. </p><p>According to Spinoza, exceptional individuals--namely, free men or those who live solely by the guidance of reason--avow the attitude of generosity towards individuals they engage. That is to say, the free man actively seeks to establish close friendships with other individuals in society, so that he may increase their power of acting through direct and dynamic interactions. In such interactions, the free man initiates others to the life of reason by getting them to directly experience what it is like to exercise their own powers of thinking, feeling, and acting. Nietzsche criticises Spinoza for diluting the depth and richness of human experience with the formulas and categories of logic, reason, or conscious thought. For instance, Spinoza credits his own affirmative stance towards all things to logical necessity, thus eliding what Nietzsche takes joyful affirmation to involve, namely, experiencing every moment of one's own existence "as good, as valuable, with pleasure." For Nietzsche, we modern individuals have come to develop ways of thinking and feeling that preclude us from harnessing our own lived experiences, and thus the expanse of difference between any one self and another. We have instead become inclined to affects like envy, pity, vanity, or ressentiment, whereby we gain our sense of well-being or power by placing ourselves on par with the persons with whom we associate. To these affects, he contrasts the pathos of distance, in which the lure or influence of one's value perspectives derives from the depth of one's immersion in one's own lived experiences and from the expanse of the difference between oneself and others. Nietzsche nonetheless believes that the pathos of distance can only thrive in an aristocratic social order, with its living hierarchy of rank and value distinctions. </p><p>I argue that we need not follow Nietzsche in this. I develop an alternative account of the pathos of distance as an affect whereby the difference one embodies engenders neither opposition nor exclusion, but rather triggers the drive for self-overcoming in those who are receptive to it. On my account, exceptional individuals cultivate and embody a way of life that wields a nourishing and life-transfiguring effect on other individuals, albeit only to the extent that they also value one another's singularities or differences. Exceptional individuals still play a distinctive role in society but not through "living structures of domination."</p><p>To illustrate this account, I present and analyse a specific kind of social change, in which people who are disadvantaged and oppressed harness their own lived experiences, with the help of exceptional individuals, to drive deep and creative forms of social change. I call this `organic social change.' Through this analysis, I inaugurate an attitude towards difference that I call `inhabiting difference.' In relation to our own specificity, we inhabit our own difference when we harness the hitherto latent powers and inchoate possibilities that our own lived experiences afford. In relation to the specificity of others, we inhabit their difference to the extent that we avow an attitude of open and abiding patience towards the singularity of their lived experiences, and cultivate direct and dynamic relationships in which they may harness powers and possibilities out of their own lived experiences. To establish the distinctive importance of inhabiting difference, I show how it facilitates empowering modes of social cooperation, and thus helps us realise new yet unknown social and political possibilities.</p> / Dissertation

This phenomenological hermeneutic research explores the author’s lived experience of painting a Sacred Mandala over the course of 15 months while focusing on child-loss by adoption. In this dissertation, the structure, process, and mindful practice of Sacred Mandala Inquiry are presented—incorporating methodological considerations, related theories, and illuminated through personal examples. Although the focus in the paper is on an individual Sacred Mandala practice, it is with the understanding that the individual is embedded within a community and world in a web of relationships. Impetus for research often arises from personal lifeworld experience. The Sacred Mandala provides structure and containment for inquiry, for those who are attracted to the form, assisting in bracketing that which has previously been accepted while simultaneously becoming a sacred boundary for the unknown to emerge, protected and witnessed. The practice and process may be taken up by inquirers in the social sciences, humanities, arts and within the community of adult learners. The mindful and embodied painting and journaling practices necessitate the inclusion of processes occurring outside of awareness—hosted in emerging images, dialogues, stories, synchronistic events, myths, metaphors, and poetry; inviting the unconscious forward. Opening both eyes—the rational and imaginal—provides a depth perspective. Both are needed, each is as real as the other, one illuminating the inner world, one illuminating the outer world, in wholeness. Importantly, the meanings embedded within the work continue to resonate, unfold, and inform over time. / Graduate / 2020-08-27

Thesis advisor: Rosanna F. DeMarco / The purpose of this study was to understand the lived experience and meanings of percutaneous injury (PI) and its aftermath among US registered nurses. An interpretive phenomenological approach was utilized to carry out the study which included nine percutaneous injury experiences. Van Manen's existential framework was used as a reflective guide. Findings from this study emerged as three essential themes which were common to all participants: being shocked: the potential of a serious or life-threatening infection; needing to know it's going to be okay; and sensing vulnerability. The first theme, <italic>being shocked</italic>, was identified as the primary mode of living with the sudden occurrence of PI. In the moment of injury, participants' language reflected shock and an immediate consciousness of the potential threat of a serious or life-threatening infection. Nurses' responses were visceral and emotional. All acted on their need to reduce foreign blood contamination and the urgency they felt for immediate care. <italic>Needing to know it's going to be okay</italic> represented the initial meaning of living in the aftermath of PI as nurses assessed their risk and sought post exposure intervention and caring responses from others. <italic>Sensing vulnerability</italic> was identified as the secondary mode of living in the aftermath of PI as participants reflected on the fragile nature of health into the future, distinguished between supportive vs. non-supportive relationships in their overall PI experience, and identified the need to be vigilant in the future with respect to their health, life and PI prevention. Together, these three essential themes and their dimensions represent the essence and meanings of percutaneous injury and its aftermath for at least one group of US registered nurses. Findings in this study support the conclusion that the lived experience of PIs and its aftermath imposed a significant psychological burden on nurses. These findings offer a better understanding of the essence and meanings of PI and its aftermath and contribute knowledge to inform nursing education, nursing practice, health policy and future research. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2010. / Submitted to: Boston College. Connell School of Nursing. / Discipline: Nursing.

År 1981 kom den första rapporten om en tidigare okänd sjukdom som senare kom att benämnas hiv. När hiv- viruset upptäcktes orsakade det stor oro, mycket på grund av att människor inte riktigt visste vad de hade att göra med. Trots ökad kunskap och medicinska framsteg fortgår spridningen av denna allvarliga sjukdom. I detta arbete beskrivs virusets uppbyggnad samt aids begreppet, men främst ligger fokus på hivpositivas och deras anhörigas upplevelser av sjukdomen. Drabbade och deras närstående är på olika sätt föremål för det sociala stigma som sjukdomen medför. De som har tillgång till bromsmediciner kan idag vänta sig att leva ett långt liv trots hiv- viruset, något som aktualiserar behovet av en ökad förståelse från omgivningen om hur sjukdomen påverkar livet. Syfte med studien är att beskriva hur det är att leva med hiv/aids i västvärlden idag, utifrån ett patient- och anhörigperspektiv. Arbetet är utformat som en litteraturstudie med kvalitativ forskningsansats. Resultatet är indelat i 3 huvudteman. Första temat är ett liv i förändring. Där beskrivs hur diagnosen kan mottas och vilka konsekvenser hiv- statusen kan få för levnadsförhållandena. Det andra temat är att mötas av okunskap, här tas det upp hur kunskap om bland annat smittspridningen är viktig för ett gott bemötande. Tredje temat är att leva med en stämpel, där beskrivs hur yttre och inre stigmatisering orsakar hinder och smärta, och hur den är en betydande faktor när det kommer till om man ska vara öppen med sin sjukdom eller ej. I diskussionen tas det upp hur öppenhet och tolerans kan främja en bättre levnadssituation för de personer som är smittade med hiv. / Program: Sjuksköterskeutbildning

Creating is the highest level of intellectual functioning in the cognitive domain. As standardized testing has increased, U.S. K-12 education has shown a decline in creativity for students. Mindfulness meditation (MM) increases creativity and could serve as a solution to this dilemma. This study's purpose was to enrich findings regarding MM's role in enhanced creativity by conducting an exploration regarding lived experiences of creating for individuals who practice MM. A gap in the literature exploring the topics of MM and creativity together using qualitative methods was identified; therefore, research understanding lived experiences of creating within the experiential context of MM was necessary. The main research question, followed by 3 closely related questions, examined the subjective meaning of the experience of creating for MM practitioners. To provide lived experiences regarding creating, 3 participants colored in a mandala and were interviewed. Descriptive transcendental phenomenology was used to explore the act of creating from the perspectives of these 3 individuals. Participants' described experiences supported Sternberg's theory that creativity developed as a habit and suggested that MM actuated Csikszentmihályi's creative flow. Positive societal implications of bringing MM into U.S. K-12 schools as a conduit for creativity cannot be overrated. MM offers an integrated modality to increased creativity, communication, collaboration, and critical thinking, or the 4 Cs. Future studies regarding MM and creativity's relationship are recommended to further enrich current literature and address the existing gap.

As Vygotsky (1986) concludes in his seminal work Thought and Language, “A word relates to consciousness as a living cell relates to a whole organism, as an atom relates to the universe. A word is a microcosm of human consciousness” (p. 246). Even without an in-depth understanding of science and only the most popular appreciation of the police procedural be it Sherlock Holmes or CSI, it is easy to see how a single cell can relate to the whole organism. But how can a word be a microcosm of human consciousness? The purpose of this study was to explore exactly that: premise, whether words reflect the lived experience of not only a person, but of a group of people, by documenting the lived experience of children in the phenomena of foreign language immersion in school (FLIIS). Using corpus linguistic techniques to analyze the nature of these children’s lexical development as well as the relationship of the perceptions of their fluency on their second language (L2) production, this study found that in order to understand the essence of what it means for a child to express him/herself fluently in his/her L2, one must understand how language functions as a transparent medium for these children and shift one’s thinking from an additive idea of language (L1, L2, L3) to the idea of interlingual consciousness.

This study seeks to explore the lived experience of competitors in high school level Oregon Style Cross-Examination Policy Debate in the state of Oregon. To elucidate this experience, between fifteen former competitors, graduating between 2003 and 2010, were interviewed in order to find common themes within the interviewees' experiences. The common themes that emerged from the interviews included establishing a knowledge base, the ability to research, effective use of communication skills, the development of confidence, and political awareness.