Alcohol abuse in cancer patients: a shadow side in the oncological field and research.

This article aims to foreground alcohol abuse by cancer patients and explore how alcohol abuse functions as a biographic master motive and at the same time is a shadow side in the oncological field and research. The research is based on a single case study which draws on empirical material from interviews, field notes and staff policy, with analysis using Bourdieu's concepts of trajectory of life and habitus. The findings show that the cancer patient's alcohol abuse is an important part of the trajectory of his private life and spare time. In social life with family and friends alcohol is given and normal and acts as a socialisator. Alcohol abuse provides both stability and instability in the cancer patient's life. When cancer results in work breaks and retirement, and spare time often is used as drinking time, then all daily life becomes drinking time for the cancer patient. Alcohol is often a hidden abuse at the working place and in the oncological field. In meetings with healthcare professionals, the patient chooses not to speak about his alcohol abuse to avoid further medicalisation. The challenge for the healthcare professionals is to see and accept alcohol abusers with cancer and their social lives without always trying to change their 'unhealthy' lifestyles

Patients’ participation in decision-making in the medical field – ‘projectification’ of patients in a neoliberal framed healthcare system

This article focuses on patients’ participation in decision-making in meetings with healthcare professionals in a healthcare system, based on neoliberal regulations and ideas.Drawing on two constructed empirical cases, primarily from the perspective of patients, this article analyses and discusses the clinical practice around decision-making meetings within a Foucauldian perspective. Patients’ participation in decision-making can be seen as an offshoot of respect for patient autonomy. A treatment must be chosen, when patients consult physicians. From the perspective of patients, there is a tendency for healthcare professionals to supply the patients with the information that they think are necessary for them to make their own decision. But patients do not always want to be a ‘customer’ in the healthcare system; they want to be a patient, consulting an expert for help and advice,which creates resistance to some parts of the decision-making process. Both professionals and patients are subject to the structural frame of the medical field, formed of both neoliberal framework and medical logic. The decision-making competence in relation to the choice of treatment is placed away from the professionals and seen as belonging to the patient. A‘projectification’ of the patient occurs, whereby the patient becomes responsible for his/her choices in treatment and care and the professionals support him/her with knowledge, preferences, and alternative views, out of which he/she must make his/her own choices, and the responsibility for those choices now and in the future. At the same time, there is a tendency towards de-professionalization. In that light, participation of patients in decision-making can be regarded as a tacit governmentality strategy that shapes the location of responsibility between individual and society, and independent patients and healthcare professionals, despite the basically desirable, appropriate, and necessary idea of involving patients in their own situations from a humanistic perspective

Reflections upon being university teachers and researchers at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic

A short reflection upon being university teachers and researchers at the time of the COVID-19 pandemi

Scandinavian nurses’ use of social media during the COVID-19 pandemic—A Berger and Luckman inspired analysis of a qualitative interview study

This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).There is a knowledge gap about nurses’ use of social media in relation to and during the COVID-19 pandemic, which demands the upholding of a physical distance to other people, including patients and their relatives. The study aims to explore how nurses in the Scandinavian countries used social media for professional purposes in relation to the first 15 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Qualitative, semi-structured interviews with 30 nurses in three Scandinavian countries (Denmark, Norway, and Sweden) were conducted. Thematic analyses were made, methodically inspired by Braun and Clarke, and theoretically inspired by Berger and Luckmann’s theory about the construction of social reality. The Standards for Reporting Qualitative Research (SRQR) checklist was used. The results showed that social media was a socialisation tool for establishing new routines in clinical practice. Virtual meeting places supported collective understandings of a specific COVID-19 ‘reality’ and ‘knowledge’ amongst nurses, with the pandemic bringing to the fore the issue of eprofessionalism among nurses relating to their clinical practice. However, social media and virtual education were not commonly used in patient contacts. Further, nurses attempted a re-socialisation of the public to proper COVID-19 behaviour through social media. Moreover, blurred boundaries between acting as a private individual and a professional nurse were identified, where ethics of the nursing profession extended to nurses’ private lives.publishedVersio

Det är som att gå i skolan” – Gruppstödsprogram för ungdomar i Sverige som har förlorat en förälder

Bakgrund: En förälders död är en av de mest dramatiska händelser som kan drabba barn och ungdomar och det kan påverka dem på många olika sätt. Syfte: Att undersöka hur ungdomar som förlorat en förälder inkluderades i ett stödprogram för sörjande familjer och hur deras deltagande tog sig uttryck. Metod: En etnografisk fältstudie där data samlades in med hjälp av observationer, semi-strukturerade intervjuer och fokusgruppsintervjuer. Sex ungdomar i ålder 10–14 år, sex föräldrar och åtta gruppledare deltog. Tematisk analys enligt Braun och Clark utfördes, inspirerad av Bourdieus begrepp fält, kapital, doxa och makt som teoretiskt ramverk. Resultat: Professionella i skolan, inom vården och socialarbete introducerade ofta stödprogrammet för föräldrar och ungdomar och övertygande initialt föräldrarna att delta i programmet. Några vuxna kände redan till att det fanns ett stödprogram. Utgångspunkten för ungdomars deltagande i stödprogrammet var att vuxna erkände att ungdomarna behövde stöd. Med eller utan förhandlingar följde ungdomarna föräldrarnas önskemål att delta i programmet. Stödprogrammet liknade skolans logik både i kontexten, innehållet och tillvägagångsättet. Strukturen och innehållet i programmet var grundat i medicinsk – psykologisk förståelse av sorg och sorgebearbetning. Gruppledarna skapade en atmosfär som liknande skolatmosfären och ungdomarna agerade som elever och utförde det om förväntades av dem. Ungdomarna interagerade endast med varandra under pauserna i stödprogrammet. Betydelse: Studien visar på betydelsen av att vuxna är lyhörda för ungdomars individuella behov av stöd då det kan variera och inte alltid sammanfaller med vuxnas föreställningar om ett bra stöd. Det är lämpligt att involvera ungdomar som förlorat en förälder vid utveckling av framtida stödinsatser riktat mot dem

Language at Stake in International Research Collaboration—Methodical Reflections on a Multi-Sited, Rapid Ethnographic Study

Based on experiences from multi-sited, rapid ethnographic fieldwork about age-friendly communities, the article aims at shedding light and reflecting on the encountered challenges and potentials regarding language and communication. Moreover, the aim is to contribute to enhancing researchers’ awareness of and preparedness to meet and address such challenges in future research endeavors. As English often serves as a lingua franca for Western-dominated international research collaborations, the implications thereof for researchers/participants, the use of interpreters, and linguistic pitfalls are discussed. Such attention is significant for international collaboration, methodical choices, and research quality. International rapid ethnographic fieldwork requires thorough preparation and reflection to properly handle linguistic and cultural competencies, nuances, and understandings incorporated in the researchers, with subsequent consequences for research processes/ outcomes

Practicing physiotherapy in Danish private practice: an ethical perspective.

Despite an increasingly growth of professional guidelines, textbooks and research about ethics in health care, awareness about ethics in Danish physiotherapy private practice seen vague. This article explores how physiotherapists in Danish private practice, from an ethical perspective, perceive to practice physiotherapy. The empirical data consists of interviews with twenty-one physiotherapists. The interviews are analysed from a hermeneutic approach, inspired by Ricoeur's textual interpretation of distanciation. The analysis follows three phases: naïve reading, structural analysis and comprehensive analysis. Four main themes are constructed: Beneficence as the driving force; Disciplining the patient through the course of physiotherapy; Balancing between being a trustworthy professional and a businessperson; The dream of a code of practice. Private practice physiotherapy is embedded in a structural frame directed by both political and economical conditions that shape the conditions for practicing physiotherapy. It means that beneficence in practice is a balance between the patient, the physiotherapists themselves and the business. Beneficence towards the patient is expressed as an implicit demand. Physiotherapeutic practice is expressed as being an integration of professionalism and personality which implies that the physiotherapists also have to benefit themselves. Private practice seems to be driven by a paternalistic approach towards the patient, where disciplining the patient is a crucial element of practice, in order to optimise profit. Physiotherapists wish for a more beneficent practice in the future by aiming at bridging 'to be' and 'ought to be'

Talen om alder, ældre og døende, ældre mennesker

Abstract in Danish Artiklen argumenterer for, at vi alle fødes som mennesker, og at vi alle dør som mennesker; starttidspunktet er os givet; sluttidspunktet kender vi ikke, og det er i princippet uden ’aldersberegning’. Vores livshistorie er med til at skabe, forme og beskrive os; gennem hele livet og også ind i døden. Alder kan forstås og beskrives på mange måder, hvor vi ofte kategoriserer og italesætter ’ældre’, som en gruppe af mennesker under afvikling. Dette har betydning for de vilkår ’ældre’ mennesker bydes, også når døden nærmer sig. Det kan se ud som om, vi afvikles som voksne mennesker i vores samfund, når vi når en vis kronologisk alder, i kombination med at blive syg eller svækket. En undersøgelse af ’talen om døden på plejehjem’ retter fokus på, hvordan der tales om ’ældres’ død på plejehjem. Der kan stilles spørgsmål ved, hvordan det enkelte menneske og dennes måde at leve liv på kan rummes i talen om, hvordan ’den gode død’ er og måden ’denne gode død’ etableres og sikres for ’ældre’ på plejehjem. Vores måder at konstruere ’kategorier’ og ’forståelser’ af mennesker og menneskelige hændelser er med til at styre vores blikke, vores tænkning og vores handlinger