Mellom profesjonell og folkelig kunnskap. En kvalitativ studie av helsepersonell sin kunnskap om og håndtering av "læsing" i en norsk-samisk kommune

Formålet med artikkelen er å beskrive helsepersonell sin forståelse av tradisjonell helbredelse og hvordan de håndterer dette fenomenet. Artikkelen er basert på to fokusgruppeintervju og semistrukturerte intervju med 13 helsepersonell i en norsk-samisk kommune.In northern Norway spiritual healing traditions are still practiced, especially among people related to Sami background and culture. Studies indicate that the general public believes that health care professionals are sceptical when it comes to the traditional spiritual healing practice known as "reading" or læsing in Norwegian. The purpose of this article is to describe healthcare providers' understanding of traditional healing, and how health care professionals handle it. A qualitative study based on semi structured interviews and two focus group interviws with 13 primary health care professionals, two physicians, seven nurses and four welfare workers, was conducted in a rural Sami area in North-Norway. The study shows that health care professionals have great knowledge of and respect for reading. The knowledge is based on the health care professional's relationship with the community. Health care professionals distinguish between how they relate to reading as private persons and as health care professionals. The analysis provides an understanding of how traditional knowledge and professional biomedical knowledge plays together in health care providers' work in primary health care. It can provide input into the development of a culturally sensitive public health care service.NF

“There are more things in heaven and earth!” How knowledge about traditional healing affects clinical practice: interviews with conventional health personnel

People with Sami and Norwegian background are frequent users of traditional folk medicine (TM). Traditional healing, such as religious prayers of healing (reading) and the laying on of hands, are examples of commonly used modalities. The global aim of this study is to examine whether health personnel’s knowledge, attitudes and experiences of traditional healing affect their clinical practice. Semi-structured individual interviews (n=32) and focus group interviews (n=2) were conducted among health personnel in two communities in Northern Norway. The text data was transcribed verbatim and analysed based on the criteria for content analysis. Six themes were identified. The participants had acquired their knowledge of traditional healing through their childhood, adolescence and experience as health personnel in the communities. They all expressed that they were positive to the patients’ use of traditional healing. They justified their attitudes, stating that “there are more things in heaven and earth” and they had faith in the placebo effects of traditional healing. The health personnel respected their patients’ faith and many facilitated the use of traditional healing. In some cases, they also applied traditional healing tools if the patients asked them to do so. The health personnel were positive and open-minded towards traditional healing. They considered reading as a tool that could help the patients to handle illness in a good way. Health personnel were willing to perform traditional healing and include traditional tools in their professional toolkit, even though these tools were not documented as evidence-based treatment. In this way they could offer their patients integrated health services which were tailored to the patients’ treatment philosophy

Mapping the experience and use of traditional healing in Northern Norway. Among conventional health care providers, users and traditional healers

The research project investigates the social processes, the understanding and experiences of traditional healing and conventional health care in three groups; The users, the traditional healers, and the health professionals. Furthermore, traditional healing as coping strategy (resilience) for the users in cases of illness was investigated. 60 semi-structured interviews and 7 focus group interviews were conducted. The researchers understand the use of traditional healing as a mechanism of resilience or a coping strategy on individual, social, and cultural levels. This tradition may be regarded as an expression of the culture in Northern Norway that binds people to an environment which is linked to a culture with a spiritual dimension that has long-lasting traditions in the communities in which the research was conducted. The use of traditional healing was an expression for the need for a spiritual dimension, that conventional health care providers do not meet. The users employed parallel treatment methods from the Norwegian conventional health care system and traditional medicine. The use of traditional healing indicated active patients and social networks

Fortellinger om læsing

En av hensiktene med denne studien er å synliggjøre og oppnå en dypere forståelse av folks bruk og erfaring med læsing i den nordnorske og samiske kulturen. Videre er det et fokus på skolemedisinske uforklarlige gode vendinger hvor helbreder er involvert. Jeg ønsker også å oppnå en dypere forståelse av hva som gjør at læsing fortsatt brukes av mange, til tross for dagens moderne, høyteknologiske helsevesen. Hva er det som gjør at tradisjonen lever videre fra generasjon til generasjon i moderne tid? Tidligere studier har vist at helbredelse er mer utbredt i den samiske befolkningen enn i den øvrige. Jeg søkte derfor bevisst etter informanter fra områder med stor andel samisk befolkning, men kom ut med et resultat at informantene ikke la stor betydning i etnisitet i forhold til læsertradisjonen. Data er innhentet ved hjelp av kvalitativ studie med semistrukturerte intervjuer av seks informanter presentert som narrativer. Alle ble bedt om å fortelle om en hendelse hvor de hadde opplevd en god vending i et sykdomsforløp hvor de hadde brukt tradisjonell helbreder. Deres fortellinger har en sentral plass i intervjuene og analysen. Fortellingene av sykdomsforløpene med gode vendinger er kondensert og bearbeidet til lesbare narrativer som blir presentert i oppgaven. Fortellingene er analysert ved hjelp av narrativ metode, hvor fokuset er innhold i historiene sammen med informantens videre refleksjoner i intervjuene. Det kan virke som om praksis i bruk av tradisjonell helbredelse avhenger av familiære relasjoner til helbrederen; terskelen for å bruke helbreder kan tyde på å være lavere jo nærmere en er i familie med helbrederen. Videreføring av helbredertradisjonen synes å være avhengig av nære familierelasjoner og hvor en bor, dette er spesielt tydelig blant de som har tilhørighet til samisk kultur. Materialet viser at det er forskjellig oppfatning av om brukerne må være troende. Når det er snakk om alvorlig sykdom/hendelse sier alle informantene at det ikke er noen som spør om tro. Henvendelse til helbreder går ofte gjennom tredje person, særlig ved alvorlig sykdom. Side iii Det å forstå og akseptere helbredelse er avhengig av å ha gjort sine egne erfaringer enten via oppvekst eller jobb. Det kan synes som om mine informanter har et annet syn på sykdom, behandling og livsverden enn skolemedisin. Alle mine informanter søker hjelp av både skolemedisin og folkemedisin. Flere av informantene forteller om opplevelser og møter med helsearbeidere som er åpne, og hvor de har kunnet snakke om temaet helbredelse uten å bli avfeiet. Disse helsearbeiderne kommer enten fra familier og områder hvor bruk av helbredelse er vanlig, eller de har tidligere erfaringer med pasientforløp hvor bruk av helbredelse har hatt en positiv innvirkning. Mål for studien er å øke forståelsen av hva tradisjonell helbredelse er, samt hvordan folk bruker tradisjonell helbredelse i forholdet til det moderne helsevesenet. Dette er et helsefelt som det er forsket lite på

Mapping the experience and use of traditional healing in Northern Norway. Among conventional health care providers, users and traditional healers

The aim of this research project was to improve the knowledge of the people in Northern Norway (the Sami, Kven, and Norwegians) understanding of health, including the use of traditional healing. We conducted 60 semi-structured interviews and 7 focus group interviews. The participants were health personnel, healers, and users of traditional healing. Both the Sami and Norwegians often used traditional healing. The users seldom reflected on the reasons for using healing as this was a natural part of their culture. In cases of illness, traditional healing was used in combination with conventional medical treatment. The users wanted the health personnel to have knowledge of the use of traditional healing to help facilitate this use for the users when they were admitted in hospitals or nursing homes. In cases of illness, the social network functioned as a collective working system and a safety net that provided practical help and support for the patients and their families. The healers explained their healing ability as a divine power that worked within them. The healers combine Christian prayers and Sami rituals with information from conventional medicine (diagnosis and medical test results) when conducting the healing rituals. The older healers trained the younger candidates. The healers had to be mentally strong, able to arouse trust, and trustworthy. The health personnel in our research project had no education in traditional healing and culture. Nevertheless, many of them conducted traditional healing including the use of familiar rituals upon the patients´ request. The health personnel claimed that this provided the users with more culturally sensitive health care services, even though the use was never documented in the patients´ medical records

Disease Prevention and Health Promotion Strategies: The Possible Side Effects of Their Good Intentions

The public health policies are principally implemented using two main strategies, namely, the population strategy and the high-risk strategy. The purpose of this article is to discuss possible side effects of the good intentions of these two main strategies. The discussions herein are made based on our perspectives and literature study methodology. Main findings portray that the disease prevention and health strategies are applied on a skewed basis, and more so, they are mainly based on medical culture and take little account of human culture. This implies that in order for individuals to comply with the health authorities’ demands, they must give up their own lifestyle coping-strategies that are contradictive to the demands. Hence, the possible side effects of the disease prevention and health promotion strategies’ good intentions; as the strategies have no explicit mandate to change the cultural norms and values. Therefore, we argue that adaptations to make the strategies more inclusive may promote public healthcare in the sense that it can work for everyone’s lifestyle, as individuals can easily take healthy actions in the normal course of their lives

"The prayer circles in the air": a qualitative study about traditional healer profiles and practice in Northern Norway

In Northern Norway, traditional healing has been preserved by passing down the knowledge through generations. Religious prayers of healing (reading) and Sami rituals (curing) are examples of methods that are used. We have examined traditional healers’ understanding of traditional healing, the healing process and their own practice, as well as what characteristics healers should have. Semi-structured individual interviews and focus group interviews were conducted among 15 traditional healers in two coastal Sami municipalities in Norway. The traditional healers understood traditional healing as the initiation of the patient’s self-healing power. This power was initiated through healing rituals and explained as the power of God and placebo effect. During the healing ritual, the doctor’s medical diagnoses, the patient’s personal data and a prayer in the name of The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit were used in combination with steel and elements from the nature. The traditional healers stated that they had to be trustworthy, calm and mentally strong. Healers who claimed that they had supernatural abilities (clairvoyant or warm hands) were regarded as extra powerful. According to the participants in this study, the healers must be trustworthy, calm and mentally strong. Moreover, these traditional healers drew on information from conventional medicine when performing their rituals

“There are more things in heaven and earth!” How knowledge about traditional healing affects clinical practice: interviews with conventional health personnel

People with Sami and Norwegian background are frequent users of traditional folk medicine (TM). Traditional healing, such as religious prayers of healing (reading) and the laying on of hands, are examples of commonly used modalities. The global aim of this study is to examine whether health personnel’s knowledge, attitudes and experiences of traditional healing affect their clinical practice. Semi-structured individual interviews (n=32) and focus group interviews (n=2) were conducted among health personnel in two communities in Northern Norway. The text data was transcribed verbatim and analysed based on the criteria for content analysis. Six themes were identified. The participants had acquired their knowledge of traditional healing through their childhood, adolescence and experience as health personnel in the communities. They all expressed that they were positive to the patients’ use of traditional healing. They justified their attitudes, stating that “there are more things in heaven and earth” and they had faith in the placebo effects of traditional healing. The health personnel respected their patients’ faith and many facilitated the use of traditional healing. In some cases, they also applied traditional healing tools if the patients asked them to do so. The health personnel were positive and open-minded towards traditional healing. They considered reading as a tool that could help the patients to handle illness in a good way. Health personnel were willing to perform traditional healing and include traditional tools in their professional toolkit, even though these tools were not documented as evidence-based treatment. In this way they could offer their patients integrated health services which were tailored to the patients’ treatment philosophy

“We own the illness”: a qualitative study of networks in two communities with mixed ethnicity in Northern Norway

Background: When people in Northern Norway get ill, they often use traditional medicine. The global aim of this study was to examine the extended family networks’ function and responsibility in cases of illness in the family, in two Northern Norwegian communities with a population of mixed ethnicity. Methods: Semi-structured individual interviews with 13 participants and 4 focus group interviews with total 11 participants were conducted. The text data was transcribed verbatim and analysed based on the criteria for content analysis. Results: The participants grew up in areas where it was common to seek help from traditional healers. They were organized in networks and shared responsibility for the patient and they provided practical help and support for the family. According to the networks, health-care personnel should make room for the entire network to visit the patient in severe and life-threatening situations. Conclusion: Traditional networks are an extra resource for people in these communities. The networks seem to be essential in handling and disseminating hope and manageability on an individual as well as a collective level. Health personnel working in communities with mixed ethnicity should have thorough knowledge of the mixed culture, including the importance of traditional network to the patients

“There are more things in heaven and earth!” How knowledge about traditional healing affects clinical practice: interviews with conventional health personnel

People with Sami and Norwegian background are frequent users of traditional folk medicine (TM). Traditional healing, such as religious prayers of healing (reading) and the laying on of hands, are examples of commonly used modalities. The global aim of this study is to examine whether health personnel’s knowledge, attitudes and experiences of traditional healing affect their clinical practice. Semi-structured individual interviews (n=32) and focus group interviews (n=2) were conducted among health personnel in two communities in Northern Norway. The text data was transcribed verbatim and analysed based on the criteria for content analysis. Six themes were identified. The participants had acquired their knowledge of traditional healing through their childhood, adolescence and experience as health personnel in the communities. They all expressed that they were positive to the patients’ use of traditional healing. They justified their attitudes, stating that “there are more things in heaven and earth” and they had faith in the placebo effects of traditional healing. The health personnel respected their patients’ faith and many facilitated the use of traditional healing. In some cases, they also applied traditional healing tools if the patients asked them to do so. The health personnel were positive and open-minded towards traditional healing. They considered reading as a tool that could help the patients to handle illness in a good way. Health personnel were willing to perform traditional healing and include traditional tools in their professional toolkit, even though these tools were not documented as evidence-based treatment. In this way they could offer their patients integrated health services which were tailored to the patients’ treatment philosophy