Date of Award

1994

Document Type

Open Access Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science in Nursing (MSN)

First Advisor

Margaret S. Wacker, RN, PhD

Second Advisor

Leslie Nield-Anderson, RN, PhD

Abstract

A qualitative, exploratory, descriptive study was designed to explore the relationship between patients' physical symptoms of illness or injury and their description of life pattern. Newman's nursing model, Health as expanding consciousness, was used as a theoretical framework with support from the Holographic paradigm and findings from Psychoneuroimmunology. Data was collected from a convenience sample of seven volunteers, adult emergency room patients. A semi-structured interview schedule and a demographic questionnaire, developed by the investigator, were used for data collection. When asked to tell the investigator the most stressful events of his life prior to the selected emergency room visit, each subject used descriptive phrases which matched the presented symptom. Three of the seven subjects presented their life pattern descriptions in a manner which also matched the presented symptom. These findings lend support to Newman's nursing model in that symptoms (health) are expressed in the process of natural evolution (expanding consciousness), and appear, as in the Holographic paradigm, to be a direct manifestation of the meaning of the individual's life pattern, or an issue therein, which has been unrecognized or unresolved by the individual. Future research is indicated to further explore the relationships found between symptoms and life pattern, and between symptoms and descriptive style.

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