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Nursing as a caring practice from a phenomenological perspective.

Spichiger E, Wallhagen MI, Benner P

Institute of Nursing Science, University Basel, Switzerland. elisabeth.spichiger@unibas.ch

Nursing is frequently described as a caring practice. What this concept means may be less clear. This paper considers nursing as a caring practice in three steps. First, the concept of practice based on Taylor's and MacIntyre's philosophical definitions of the term is described. Secondly, numerous notions of caring are presented; the call from some nurse researchers for quantification of the concept and why this is problematic is discussed; and an exposition of caring from a phenomenological perspective is provided. Finally, the notions of practice and caring are joined, and the concept of a caring practice is presented. Nursing as a public caring practice is illustrated with examples from an interpretive phenomenological study. In conclusion, it is claimed that a phenomenological view of caring combined with a comprehensive definition of practice is well suited to nursing, and allows for a description of nurses' caring practices from both a nursing and patient perspective.

Published 5 December 2005 in Scand J Caring Sci, 19(4): 303-9.
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