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Convalescence and Implications for Nursing Research
Author(s) -
Davis Linda Lindsey
Publication year - 1987
Publication title -
image: the journal of nursing scholarship
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.009
H-Index - 80
eISSN - 1547-5069
pISSN - 0743-5150
DOI - 10.1111/j.1547-5069.1987.tb00606.x
Subject(s) - convalescence , rehabilitation , affect (linguistics) , medicine , nursing , psychology , psychiatry , physical therapy , surgery , communication
Much has been written about the rehabilitation of individuals who experience major illnesses such as heart attack, stroke, burns, cancer and traumatic injury; yet little is known about their experience of convalescence. Seldom does a convalescent experience affect only ill or injured individuals. Rather the experience also affects the lives of those other persons with whom thy are involved. Through an analysis of the illness attributes of identity, causalty, duration and consequence, this paper explores the experience of convalescence after a life‐threatening illness. The crisis and chronic aspects of convalescence are compared and contrasted, and the problem subsets for future nursing research on the experience of convalescence are proposed.