Rehabilitation Nursing with Women Diagnosed with Breast Cancer : Focusing on the Time Between Diagnosis and the Return to their Homes

Abstract

Abstract

The objective of this research is to clarify the concept of rehabilitation nursing of women with breast cancer from the standpoint of such women's determination to survive from the time they are diagnosed as having cancer. This research was designed so as to clarify aspects of nursing practices, taking into consideration the Walker and Avant method of concept analysis.

The data was collected through interviews with and observations of women with breast cancer and nurses who are engaged in the nursing of them. As a result, the following conclusions were reached regarding the concept attributes in terms of rehabilitation nursing of women with breast cancer : 1. Nurses assist women in facing the challenges arising as a result of their illness. 2. Nurses assist women in taking active part in new lifestyles. 3. Nurses assist women in reconstructing their lives. 4. Nurses assist women in finding meaning in their new lives. It could also be inferred that the fourth concept listed above was a central part of the other three. It could also be said that such women's experience with breast cancer is a transition : leaving behind their old lifestyles as lived up to the time of the diagnosis, and creating new lifestyles.

In listing the concepts of rehabilitation nursing of women with breast cancer based on these points, it could be said that nurses ameliorate the quality of women's experiences with breast cancer by helping them deal with their experiences, participate in new lifestyles, reconstruct their lives (transition), and find some kind of meanings within such new lives, as well as helping women grow throught their experience with cancer.

Such nursing practices are described in detail, based on the aforementioned four conceptual attributes.