La relación enfermera-paciente: “a veces lo único que necesitas… es tomar la mano de la persona…”

Watson established the humanized care as a research phenomenon. It remains an ethical responsibility of nurses in the context of a transpersonal relationship that enhance the harmony and individuals integrity. Humanized care now faces a dilemma for a coexistence of diverse institutional, biomedical, administrative-economist and humanist axiological models. Objective: To know the perception of care, according to lived experience of three retired nurses, through authentic stories. Methodology: A qualitative, phenomenological study describes the experiences through authentic stories of three retired nurses obtained by in-depth interviews. Homogeneous sample selection criteria: nurses belonging to 3 generations removed extensive experience in closed care, participation in training students. Results: four categories were found concatenated with each other , which reconfigure the essence of care, emphasizing the integral character of the people and harmonizing the relational dimension with the technical-scientific dimension. Nurse as a caregiver; person as being of care; essence of care and vocational training. Conclusion: Knowing the perception of retired nurses, regarding care is a contribution for reflection. It is necessary to aim for humanized care, as an ethical duty of nurses. The intervention of various institutional axiological models weakens the possibility of guiding care towards humanization. There is a risk of fragmenting people, leaving aside individualized, warmth care, generated through a transpersonal relationship.