Journal of clinical nursing
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study Clinical Trial
Cancer nursing practice development: understanding breathlessness.
This paper considers methodological and philosophical issues that arose during a multi-centre, randomized controlled trial of a new nursing intervention to manage breathlessness with patients with primary lung cancer. Despite including a diverse range of instruments to measure the effects of the intervention, the uniqueness of individuals' experiences of breathlessness were often hidden by a requirement to frame the study within a reductionist research approach. Evidence from the study suggests that breathlessness is only partly defined when understood and explored within a bio-medical framework, and that effective therapy can only be achieved once the nature and impact of breathlessness have been understood from the perspective of the individual experiencing it. We conclude that to work therapeutically we need to know how patients interpret their illness and its resultant problems and that this demands methodological creativity.
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This study was designed to identify the feelings and experiences of critical care nurses who have been involved in nursing brain dead patients prior to organ donation. The purpose of the study was to generate knowledge which informs the discipline of nursing. ⋯ The interpretative analysis in this study has revealed a range of meanings articulated by the nurses involved. However, the primary focus of care--as identified by the participating nurses--was the donor family.