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Purpose Anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS) are used for their aesthetic and performance-enhancing effects and are associated with physical and psychological side effects. Behavioural changes/side effects as mood swings, aggressiveness, depression, potency problems, anxiety, and emotional coldness have been reported by next of kin to people using AAS. Methods This phenomenological study is based on the reflective lifeworld research approach. Interviews were conducted with twelve next of kin about their experiences of living close to persons using AAS. Results Next of kin to persons using AAS are particularly vulnerable because they experience little opportunity to influence their situation. Their given and safe context is lost, and their lives are circumscribed by feelings of insecurity, fear, powerlessness, and grief. Feelings of loneliness develop when their problems are not noticed by others and support is lacking from family and society. Conclusions Our research adds important knowledge on how the use of AAS affects next of kin. Understanding is required to approach the lifeworld of next of kin with flexibility and empathy in their difficulties and vulnerability. Healthcare professionals and other concerned professions need to be aware of next of kin existential needs to be able to meet and support them in their life situation.

Background This study aims to investigate the lived experience of well-being among older patients and their relatives in the transition from hospital to home after early discharge. Research has shown that the transition brings severe challenges to their everyday lives. However, to date, there has been a lack of research focusing on the lived experiences of well-being during this process. Methods The data collection and analysis followed the phenomenological approach of Reflective Lifeworld Research. Ten in-depth interviews with older patients and their relatives were conducted in Austria up to 2–5 days after hospital discharge. Results The essential meaning of the phenomenon of well-being in the transition from hospital to home is marked by security and confidence to face the challenges following the discharge. Four constituents emerged: being calm and in alignment with the homecoming, being in familiar surroundings at home—a sense of belonging, striving towards independence—continuity of life and having faith in the future. Conclusion Our findings point to the importance of recognizing the vulnerability associated with the transition from hospital to home, as it impacts the existential aspects of space and time. Facilitating a sense of continuity and belonging can foster well-being during this critical period.

Purpose To address the consequences of living with supraventricular tachycardia and to improve the quality of treatment, there is a need to highlight patient experiences of treatment with catheter ablation. Therefore, the aim was to describe the phenomenon of catheter ablation, as it is experienced by patients being treated awake. Methods A descriptive design was applied based on a reflective lifeworld research founded on phenomenological epistemology. Interviews were conducted between December 2021 and Mars 2022 with seven women and five men, three to twelve months after they underwent catheter ablation. Results Patients undergoing catheter ablation while awake during treatment, which includes experiences of relying on others expertise, being actively passive, and striving to be cured. It entails experiences of having a foreign object moving in one’s body and heart and can be endured through strategies of mainly shifted one’s mental focus. Conclusions The effort of undergoing a catheter ablation procedure is worthwhile as the confirmation of a physical curable condition that opens a future with possibilities instead of the obstacle in daily life that tachycardia entails. For the patients, an informative and caring conversation was needed that would have provided the support they lacked before and during the ablation.

We offer a theoretical and empirical exploration of parental or guardian hope through an enactive, ecological, and reflective lifeworld research framework. We examine hoping as a practice, or know-how, by exploring the shape of interviewees’ lives as they prepare for lives to come. We pursue hoping as a necessarily shared practice–a social agency–rather than an individual emotion. One main argument is that hoping operates as a kind of languaging. An enactive-ecological approach shifts scholarly conversations around hope, in part by including voices of non-scholars and considering lifeworld factors like class privilege. We aim to identify particular impediments to or facilitators of hope, which may be thought of as classes of restrictive and generative thought-shapers, respectively. Results from our qualitative study indicate that uncertainty is deeply salient to hoping, not only because hope as a concept entails epistemic limits, but more vitally because not knowing, when done skillfully and when supported through education and some degree of socio-economic security, leaves room for others to reframe utterances, and so for the family or community to resist linguistic enclosure.

What enables well-being when experiencing existential concerns as a young adult is an under-explored area of research. In order to address young adults’ existential concerns and provide caring support that builds their resilience to meet life challenges, the purpose of the study is to describe the meaning of enabling well-being as experienced by young adults living with existential concerns. This phenomenological study is based on a reflective lifeworld research. Seventeen young adults, aged 17–27 years, were interviewed. The results is presented in an essential meaning and further explored with its variations and individual nuances of the phenomenon; enabling well-being. The essential meaning of enabling well-being, when experiencing existential concerns as a young adult, means finding a place to rest. Finding a place to rest means finding both movement and stillness in life to reflect upon one’s life story in order to understand oneself. The results also show that young adults enable their own well-being in many ways when experiencing existential concerns. When their existential concerns feel overwhelming, they need support from healthcare professionals. When young adults seek professional support, the professionals must be open and focus on the young adults’ life story to enable well-being.

Purpose The aim of the study was to describe the loss of a family member by suicide, based on the lived experience of suicide survivors. Methods A phenomenology study with a Reflective Lifeworld Research approach was conducted, consisting of sixteen interviews with eight suicide survivors. Results The essence of losing a family member by suicide encompasses experiences of involuntary and existential loneliness, life suffering, and additional burdens in a life that is radically transformed, comprising prolonged and energy-intensive attempts to understand. Life for the family member encompasses a constant fear of being judged and an ambiguous silence, where this silence can both lead to involuntary loneliness and be a source of support and fellowship. Support mechanisms inside the family fall apart, and it becomes obvious that the survivors’ experiences affect others. The loss also implies an active endeavour to maintain the memory of the deceased. Conclusions Based on these results, it is important for professionals to accept the survivors as suffering human beings early—from the point of the notification of death—and consider them as patients in need of compassionate care. Such support might reduce life suffering, counteract stigma and involuntary loneliness, and work simultaneously as suicide prevention.

Anabolic androgenic steroids are used by women to increase their muscle mass and because of their performance-enhancing effects. Despite permanent/high risk of side effects, knowledge is inadequate. Our aim has been to deepen understanding about women's use of anabolic androgenic steroids. This phenomenological study is based on the reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach. Lifeworld interviews were conducted with 12 women, aged 21–56 years, about their experiences of using anabolic steroids. The results show that women experience a sense of pride when they successfully achieve their goals. This is the driving force, triggering tension between suffering and success. Our research adds important knowledge from a reflective lifeworld perspective and shows that women's use of anabolic androgenic steroids is a complex phenomenon. Understanding and knowledge are important in order to be able to meet and support women in their fears and difficulties.

Purpose: Anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS) are used by men for their aesthetic and performance-enhancing effects and are associated with risk for side effects. Our research aims to deepen knowledge and understanding of men´s experiences of using AAS. Method: This phenomenological study is based on the reflective lifeworld research approach. Lifeworld interviews were conducted with twelve men about their experiences of using AAS. Results: By using AAS, men strive towards a muscular, strong and athletic ideal. Self-imposed demands, self-discipline and performance accelerate male physical development. The perfect male body ideal thus attained is fragile from both an existential and a biological perspective. The perfect self-image can easily be shattered by adversity. A man’s very existence may be jeopardized if the use of AAS is revealed to others or if the body is let down by illness. Conclusions: Men´s use of AAS is a complex phenomenon. It partly concerns a traditional view of masculinity that is reflected in the community. It requires both broad and deep knowledge and understanding to be able to meet men using AAS in their problems and vulnerability; a meeting that is hampered by their low trust in healthcare, and by the fact that AAS are illegal.

Purpose: The aim was to describe patients’ lived experience of warmth and coldness in connection with surgery. Methods: A reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach founded on phenomenology and the methodological principles of openness, flexibility, and bridling were used. The data consisted of 16 in-depth interviews with patients from four hospitals in Sweden. Results: Warmth and coldness in connection with surgery means an expectation to maintain one´s daily life temperature comfort. When patients’ needs of temperature comfort is fulfilled it give a sense of well-being and calmness. Despite the body is covered there are feelings of vulnerability. When patients have the ability to change their own temperature comfort, they feel independent. Conclusion: The individual feeling of temperature comfort could be affected or changed to discomfort during the perioperative context, and an intervention is required to avoid suffering due to the care. An ability to independently influence one´s own temperature comfort can strengthen the patient, whereas the opposite entails suffering in silence. The phenomenon is also related to feelings of confidence about receiving the best care as well as being exposed and vulnerable. When the patient´s need of comfortable temperature is met then feelings of security and sense of well-being emerged.

Purpose: The aim of this study is to describe new fathers’ expectations of and experiences with municipal postnatal healthcare services. Methods: A phenomenological reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach has been used. Ten fathers were interviewed about their expectations of and experiences with municipal postnatal healthcare services, and the data were analysed to elucidate a meaning structure for the phenomenon. Results: The essential meaning of the phenomenon of fathers’ expectations of and experiences with municipal postnatal health care described as going blindly into the women’s world. The essential meaning is further explicated through its four constituents: not knowing what to ask for, feeling excluded, seeking safety for the family and longing for care. Conclusions: Entering the postnatal period with sparse knowledge about the child and family healthcare services available is difficult for the fathers who do not know what to ask for and what to expect. The fathers’ feel excluded by the public health nurse, and the postnatal health care is seen as a mother–baby–public health nurse triad. The feeling of exclusion and inequality might be avoided if public health nurses focused both on mothers’ and fathers’ individual follow-up needs in the postnatal period and on seeing the newborn baby and the parents as a family unit.

The birthing room is a major workplace for midwives but how it influences them in practice is not enough investigated. Purpose: This study aimed to explore midwives´ experiences of how the birthing room affects them in their work to promote a normal physiological birth. Methods: A phenomenological reflective lifeworld research approach was used and included individual interviews with 15 midwives working at four different hospitals in western Sweden, and of which two also assisted at homebirths. The analysis focused on the meanings of the study phenomenon. Results: A birthing room can by its design either support a normal physiological birth or support a risk approach to childbirth. Four opposing constituents complete the essential meaning of the birthing rooms, and to which the midwives need to relate in their roles as guardians for normal birth: i) a private or a public room; ii) a home-like or hospital-like room; iii) a room promoting activity or passivity; iv) a room promoting the midwife´s presence or absence. Conclusions: The birthing room mirrors a pathogenic-oriented care approach. A presupposition for the work to keep the birth bubble intact is to protect the mother from disturbing elements both inside and outside the room.

Purpose This study aimed to describe extended collaboration in situations when an ambulance was called, as experienced by older patients, a significant other, and ambulance- and primary healthcare (PHC) centre personnel. Methods The study used a phenomenological reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach. Participants included in three specific situations with extended collaboration were interviewed: three older patients, one significant other, three ambulance personnel and four personnel at the PHC centre. The transcribed interviews were analysed for meanings of the phenomenon. Results The extended collaboration means that decisions were supported through dialogue by bridging knowledge spaces between person, within-team and across-team levels. Through dialogue experience and knowledge were shared and certainty in decisions was increased. The extended collaboration was built on trust, responsibility taken, shared and entrusted, and the common goal of adapted care for the unique patient. A need for further improvement and transparency was elucidated. Conclusions The difficulty of making care decisions stresses the importance of available extended collaboration based on the dialogue between patients, significant others, and ambulance- and PHC centre personnel to increase certainty in decisions. Collaboration further requires respectful encounters, trust, responsibility and a common goal of adapting the care for the unique patient.

Being pregnant, giving birth, and becoming a mother the first months after birth, is for women with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) a period of difficult challenges. In order to identify their need of support from healthcare, the aim of this study was to describe healthcare during pregnancy, labour, birth, and up to 12 weeks after birth as experienced by Swedish women with T1DM. We used a phenomenological reflective lifeworld research approach, and made 1-2 individual interviews with ten women in late pregnancy and/or 2-3 months after. Transcribed interviews were analysed through focusing on the meanings of the study phenomenon. The results revealed how the diabetes disease, as well as the risks and responsibility that comes with it, become more visible during the period in question, due to a constant monitoring, performed by the woman herself as well as by the healthcare professionals. The essential meaning of the phenomenon is a need to share the burden of risks and responsibilities with healthcare professionals. The complex situation that these women are in, both as experts on their illness and care and in need of care, requires a care that make women feel capable and responsible, but at the same time offers support and relieve them of their responsibility when needed.

Introduction Young men may struggle in life with challenges of various concerns about their identity and who they want to be in life. Many health issues arise from social norms and wider societal determinations and for today’s young men, following such norms poses a risk of losing oneself. An essential part of health are connected to the existential dimensions in life and concerns who you are, and how well you know and understand yourself. However; little is known about what it means for young men to live a life with existential concerns. Purpose and method The purpose of this phenomenological study, based on reflective lifeworld research (RLR), is to describe young men’s experiences of living with existential concerns for which they have sought support. Eight lifeworld interviews were conducted. Results The results essentially show that young men living with existential concerns describe their situations as living close to a bottomless darkness. This is further described according to four constituents: enduring everyday life, striving for a solution, hearing an inner self-critical voice, and wearing a hard shell. Conclusion We conclude that strengthening young men’s health processes requires healthcare professionals to create an atmosphere where young men feel safe talking about existential concerns without feeling exposed and vulnerable.

Purpose: The aim of the study was to describe how women with stress-related illness experience well-being in everyday life. Methods: The study was based on a reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach and the methodological principles of openness, flexibility and bridling. Twelve women, aged 27–54 years, diagnosed with stress-related illness were included. Data were collected with lifeworld interviews based on photographs taken by the women relating to well-being in everyday life. The data were analysed for meaning. Results: Well-being emerged in situations where women could feel an unconditional beingness. This entails not having demands on oneself and includes some form of freedom from having to perform. The surroundings and supportive environments are important for this unconditional beingness to be present. In order to feel well-being in everyday life, the women need to balance their energy and find helpful tools that can achieve a balance in everyday life. Conclusions: Healthcare staff need to understand the importance of unconditional beingness in supportive environments for patients living with stress-related illness in order to support their health and well-being. It is also important to support patients in finding helpful tools that can aid them to achieve a balance in everyday life.

Introduction: Ageing is often associated with multiple long-term health problems influencing older persons’ well-being in daily living. It is not unusual that the point of interest in research is often on the management of the actual health problem instead of being holistic and person-centred. Purpose: To describe the phenomenon of living with long-term health problems that influence daily living, from the older persons’ perspective. Methods: Qualitative individual interviews were conducted with 34 older persons living with long-term health problems. The data were analysed using a Reflected Lifeworld Research (RLR) approach, grounded in phenomenology. Results: Life with long-term health problems entails living in a diminishing world. It entails living in uncertainty, not being able to trust one’s own ability. The freedom to make decisions of your own is deprived by relatives and health-care providers. Living with long-term health problems entails being dependent on support in daily life and a strive to maintain meaningfulness in daily living. Conclusions: The results address a need for extended individual and holistic guidance and support in living with long-term health problems to increase the older person’s sense of well-being and meaning in life.

Phenomenological research is one of the most prominent qualitative research strategies. It is quite different research approach in terms of scientific rigorousness. Being part of qualitative research, phenomenological research holds same attributes of rigorousness as all scientific research – objectivity, validity generalizability. Just those attributes manifest differently in a different types of research. One attribute – reflexivity of a researcher is a prominent feature of phenomenological research, that speaks for scientific rigorousness with a same strength as the rest attributes. The author of this paper argues that reflexivity of a researcher is one of major and strongest scientific attributes of a scientific rigor. Arguments come from reflective lifeworld research philosophy and methodology as well as original research illustrations from Lithuania and the Netherlands.

Purpose: The aim of this study is to describe young women’s (16–25 years old) experiences of living with existential concerns for which they have sought support from healthcare professionals, teachers, family, or friends, among others. Methods: This phenomenological study is based on a reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach. Nine young women were interviewed about their experience of living with existential concerns. Results: The results show the essential meaning of the phenomenon of “existential concerns” that can be described as living a life that is marked in a profound way by a feeling of being lost in an unknown terrain. To further understand the essential meaning, four constituents are described: the unpredictable body, longing for comprehension, playing a game, and longing to share one’s vulnerability. Conclusions: Young women with existential concerns are vulnerable, as they are profoundly influenced by these concerns. They have to navigate through daily life while trying to fit in and to make their situation comprehensible. These young women have a longing to share their existential concerns with a trustworthy person, while at the same time they fear revealing their existential concerns and risking being rejected by others. A lifeworld-led, caring science approach, intertwined with the results of the present study, has the potential to direct caring practice.

Phenomena in caring science are often complex and laden with meanings. Empirical research with the aim of capturing lived experiences is one way of revealing the complexity. Sometimes, however, results from empirical research need to be further discussed. One way is to further abstract the result and/or philosophically examine it. This has previously been performed and presented in scientific journals and doctoral theses, contributing to a greater understanding of phenomena in caring science. Although the intentions in many of these publications are laudable, the lack of methodological descriptions as well as a theoretical and systematic foundation can contribute to an ambiguity concerning how the results have emerged during the analysis. The aim of this paper is to describe the methodological support for the further abstraction of and/or philosophical examination of empirical findings. When trying to systematize the support procedures, we have used a reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach. Based on the assumptions in RLR, this article will present methodological support for a theoretical examination that can include two stages. In the first stage, data from several (two or more) empirical results on an essential level are synthesized into a general structure. Sometimes the analysis ends with the general structure, but sometimes there is a need to proceed further. The second stage can then be a philosophical examination, in which the general structure is discussed in relation to a philosophical text, theory, or concept. It is important that the theories are brought in as the final stage after the completion of the analysis. Core dimensions of the described methodological support are, in accordance with RLR, openness, bridling, and reflection. The methodological support cannot be understood as fixed stages, but rather as a guiding light in the search for further meanings.

Aim: To explore and describe the essential meaning of lived experiences of the phenomenon: Everyday life during curative radiotherapy in patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Background: Radiotherapy treatment in patients with NSCLC is associated with severe side effects such as fatigue, anxiety, and reduced quality of life. However, little is known about the patients’ experience of everyday life during the care trajectory. Design: This study takes a reflective lifeworld approach using an empirical application of phenomenological philosophy described by Dahlberg and colleagues. Method: A sample of three patients treated with curative radiotherapy for NSCLC was interviewed 3 weeks after the end of radiotherapy treatment about their experiences of everyday life during their treatment. Data were collected in 2014 and interviews and analysis were conducted within the descriptive phenomenological framework. Findings: The essential meaning structure of the phenomenon studied was described as “Hope for recovery serving as a compass in a changed everyday life,” which was a guide for the patients through the radiotherapy treatment to support their efforts in coping with side effects. The constituents of the structure were: Radiotherapy as a life priority, A struggle for acceptance of an altered everyday life, Interpersonal relationships for better or worse, and Meeting the health care system. Conclusion: The meaning of hope was essential during radiotherapy treatment and our results suggest that interpersonal relationships can be a prerequisite to the experience of hope. “Hope for recovery serving as a compass in a changed everyday life,” furthermore identifies the essentials in the patients’ assertive approach to believing in recovery and thereby enabling hope in a serious situation.

Purpose: Previous research shows that the learning space is significant for students’ learning in pairs in clinical practice but does not explain the meaning of the phenomenon. The aim of this study is thus to explain and understand the learning space that occurs in the interaction between the patients, the pairs of nursing students, and the supervisors on a developing and learning care unit in Sweden. Method: The study has been carried out with a Reflective Lifeworld Research (RLR) approach founded on hermeneutics. A total of 39 informants, consisting of 16 patients, five pairs of students (10 students), and 13 supervisors, were observed and interviewed. Results: The results reveal that an interpersonal linkage between the patients, the students, and the supervisors is created within the learning space. A learning space, based on respect towards each other, creates the prerequisite for beneficial and supportive interactions that contribute to a deeper relationship. Conclusion: The phenomenon is complex due to its expandable nature and due to the fact that the learning space cannot be isolated from the surrounding environment. In order to exploit the potential of the learning space it is of importance to understand and consider the learning space as a whole.

Evidence confirms that nature-based therapy (NBT) has a positive effect on people with mental illnesses. However, there is a lack of evidence on the meaning of NBT for specific patient groups. The Nacadia® Therapy Garden was designed according to an evidence-based design process, and an NBT programme was developed. The aim of the study was to illuminate the phenomenon of participants’ lived experience of the NBT in Nacadia. Fourteen participants took part in semi-structured interviews (SSIs), and by way of reflective lifeworld research, the SSIs were analysed to identify and describe the meanings of the phenomenon. The essence of the phenomenon was found to be a process of adopting a searching approach to NBT and Nacadia to become familiar with the conditions. This familiarity stimulated the development of confidentiality and attachment to Nacadia. Feeling protected, safe, cared for, and not exposed was important, and motivated feelings of freedom, reduced demands, and increased the ability to access and try a spectrum of NBT activities. It encouraged participants to develop personal approaches and coping strategies to implement in their everyday lives for moving on.

Hip fractures are amongst the leading causes of admission to an orthopaedic ward. Systematized pathways with reduced admission time have become increasingly common as an essential tool for quality development and to improve efficiency in the hospital setting. The aim of this study was to clarify if the patients feel empowered and able to perform self-care after short time stay in hospital (STSH) due to a hip fracture. The study used descriptive phenomenology to describe experiences of the pathway. Field studies were conducted in hospitals and in the patients' homes. Interviews were performed with 10 patients recruited from two wards at a Danish University hospital, 4 family members and 15 health professionals from three hospitals. The open attitude of reflective lifeworld research guided the analysis. The findings revealed that patients felt unprepared and insecure about their future, but also had a strong desire to be in charge of their own lives. Of all the patients interviewed, none had any recollection of the information given to them by health professionals during their hospital admission. This study demonstrates that empowerment of patients with hip fractures is not adequately achieved in the pathway with STSH.

When children endure needle-related medical procedures (NRMPs), different emotions arise for the child and his/her parents. Despite the parents’ own feelings, they have a key role in supporting their child through these procedures. The aim of this study is to describe the meanings of supporting children during NRMPs from the perspective of the parents. Twenty-one parents participated in this study. A reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach was used and phenomenological analysis was applied. The essential meaning of the phenomenon—supporting children during an NRMP—is characterized as “keeping the child under the protection of one's wings,” sometimes very close and sometimes a little further out under the wingtips. The essential meaning is additionally described through its constituents: paying attention to the child's way of expressing itself, striving to maintain control, facilitating the child's understanding, focusing the child's attention, seeking additional support, and rewarding the child. The conclusion is that parents’ ability to be supportive can be affected when seeing their child undergo an NRMP. To regain the role as the child's protector and to be able to keep the child “under the protection of one's wings,” parents need support from the staff.

Children state that among their worst fears during hospitalization are those related to various nursing procedures and to injections and needles. Nurses thus have a responsibility to help children cope with needle-related medical procedures (NRMP) and the potentially negative effects of these. The aim of the study is to describe the lived experience of supporting children during NRMP, from the perspective of nurses. Fourteen nurses took part in the study, six of whom participated on two occasions thus resulting in 20 interviews. A reflective lifeworld research approach was used, and phenomenological analysis was applied. The result shows that supporting children during NRMP is characterized by a desire to meet the child in his/her own world and by an effort to reach the child's horizon of understanding regarding these actions, based on the given conditions. The essential meaning of the phenomenon is founded on the following constituents: developing relationships through conversation, being sensitive to embodied responses, balancing between tact and use of restraint, being the child's advocate, adjusting time, and maintaining belief. The discussion focuses on how nurses can support children through various types of conversation and by receiving help from the parents’ ability to be supportive, and on whether restraint can be supportive or not for children during NRMP. Our conclusion is that nurses have to see each individual child, meet him/her in their own world, and decide on supportive actions while at the same time balancing their responsibility for the completion of the NRMP. This work can be described as “balancing on a tightrope” in an unpredictable situation.

This article illuminates the essence of Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) nurses’ attitudes in skin-to-skin care (SSC) practice for preterm infants and their parents. Health care providers are in a unique position to influence the dynamic between infants and parents, and SSC affects both partners in the dyad. The design is descriptively phenomenological in terms of reflective lifeworld approach. Eighteen Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian nurses from NICUs offering varied possibilities and extents of SSC participated. NICU nurses’ attitudes in SSC practice are ambivalent. The nurses consider the sensory, wellness, and mutuality experiences to be primary and vital and enact SSC as much as possible. But “as much as possible” is a broad and varied concept, and their attitudes are ambivalent in terms of not always facilitating what they consider to be the optimal caring conditions. The source of NICU nurses’ ambivalent attitudes in SSC practice is a complex interplay of beliefs, norms, and evidence, which have a multidisciplinary basis. The ambivalent attitudes are, to a great extent, the result of the need to balance these multidisciplinary concerns. This needs to be acknowledged in considering SSC practice, as well as acknowledging that clinical judgments concerning optimal SSC depend on parents and infants unlimited access to each other, which NICU nurses can influence.

This study explores the lived experience of losing a leg as described by the patients themselves post-discharge. Studies have documented that regardless of aetiology patients are faced with severe physical as well as psychosocial challenges post-amputation. However, only few studies explore in-depth the patients’ perspective on the various challenges following the loss of a leg. The study uses the phenomenological approach of Reflective Lifeworld Research (RLR). Data were collected from 24 in-depth interviews with 12 Danish patients. Data analysis was performed according to the guidelines given in RLR. The essential meaning of losing a leg is a radical and existential upheaval, which restricts patients’ lifestyle and irretrievably alters their lifeworld. Life after the operation is associated with despair, and a painful sense of loss, but also with the hope of regaining personal independence. The consequences of losing a leg gradually materialize as the patients realize how the loss of mobility limits their freedom. Patients experience the professional help as primarily directed towards physical care and rehabilitation. The findings show that the loss of a leg and, subsequently, the restricted mobility carry with them an existential dimension which refers to limitation of action space and loss of freedom experienced as an exclusion from life. Our findings demonstrate a need for complementary care and stress the importance of an increased awareness of the psychosocial and existential consequences of losing a limb.

The aim of this article is to articulate the essence and constituents of neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) nurses’ experiences in enacting skin-to-skin care (SSC) for preterm newborns and their parents. SSC is commonly employed in high-tech NICUs, which entails a movement from maternal–infant separation. Parents’ opportunities for performing the practice have been addressed to NICU staff, with attitude and environment having crucial influence. The study was carried out with a reflective lifeworld research approach. Data were collected in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway by open-dialogue interviews with a purposive sample of 18 NICU nurses to achieve the essence of and variation within the phenomenon. NICU nurses experience balancing what they consider preterm newborns’ current and developmental needs, with readiness in both parents for SSC. They share an experience of a change in the history of NICU care to increased focus on the meaning of proximity and touch for the infants’ development. The phenomenon of enacting SSC is characterized by a double focus with steady attention to signals from both parents and newborns. Thereby, a challenge emerges from the threshold of getting started as the catalyst to SSC.

A majority of women in Sweden initiate breastfeeding but almost a quarter stop or wean the infant in the first few weeks after birth because of difficulties. In order to develop care that facilitates initiation of breastfeeding and enables mothers to realize their expectations concerning breastfeeding, it is necessary to understand what having severe breastfeeding difficulties means for women who experience them. The aim of this study is to describe the lived experiences of initiating breastfeeding under severe difficulties. A reflective lifeworld research design was used. Eight women, seven primiparous and one multipara, were interviewed within 2 months of giving birth. The essential meaning of the phenomenon is described as “Existential lostness as a mother forcing oneself into a constant fight”. This pattern is further explicated through its constituents; shattered expectations, a lost time for closeness, being of no use to the infant, being forced to expose oneself, and gaining strength through sharing. The results show that mothers with severe breastfeeding difficulties feel alone and exposed because of their suffering and are lost in motherhood. Thus, adequate care for mothers should enhance the forming of a caring relationship through sharing rather than exposing.

Treating patients with hard-to-heal wounds is a complex task that requires a holistic view. Therefore this study focuses on the nurse's perspective with the aim on describing how community nurses experience the phenomenon the care of patients with hard-to-heal wounds. The method used was a reflective lifeworld approach. Seven qualitative interviews with community nurses were conducted. The findings show a tension between enriching and burdensome care. In this tension, the nurses try to find energy to reach harmony in their work through reflection, acceptance, and distance. This is further described by the constituents: “taking responsibility,” “showing respect for the whole person,” “being confident in order to offer confidence,” “seeing time and place as important.” The discussion highlights the importance for a nurse to find how to give ideal care in one's duty but not beyond it. As a consequence the concept “compliance” needs to be challenged in order to promote confidence and mutual trust between nurses and patients. Confidence can be seen as a key, both for nurses and patients, and is dependent on good inter-professional cooperation, competence, and closure.

For most Swedish women, breastfeeding is an essential part of the childbearing period. Yet, the meaning of breastfeeding from women's perspective is scantily explored. Therefore, the aim of this study is to describe women's lived experiences of initiating breastfeeding within the context of early home discharge. Eight women, two primiparous, and six multiparous were interviewed within 2 months after birth. A reflective lifeworld research design based on phenomenological philosophy was used during the data gathering and data analysis. The results show that the phenomenon, initiating breastfeeding, in spite of good conditions, i.e., early home discharge, is complex and entails an existential challenge. The essential meaning of the phenomenon is conceptualized as, “A movement from a bodily performance to an embodied relation with the infant and oneself as a mother.” This pattern is further described in its five constituents: “Fascination in the first encounter,” “Balancing the unknown,” “Devoting oneself and enduring the situation,” “Seeking confirmation in the unique,” and “Having the entire responsibility.” Caring for women initiating breastfeeding entails, from a caring science perspective, to help the mother meet insecurity and strengthen confidence to trust her ability to breastfeed the newborn infant. According to these findings, it is suggested in the discussion that it is time for health care professionals to reject the idea of breastfeeding merely as meals or eating for the infant. Instead, they ought to embrace its origin, namely as a way to closeness between mother and infant.