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Dignity in Care for Older People
- 2009. - 1
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Samlingsverk (redaktörskap) (refereegranskat)abstract
- The notion of quality of life has for several decades been well-established in ethical debate about health care and the care of older people. Dignity in Care for Older People highlights the notion of dignity within the care of the elderly, focusing on the importance of theoretical concepts. Primarily based on a Research Project, Dignity and Older Europeans, funded by the European Commission, this book provides a thorough investigation of the concept of dignity and related concepts such as quality of life and autonomy. It includes a chapter devoted to the dignity of human embodiment, emphasizing the importance of the notion of the lived body in the context of elderly care. As a result of the conceptual study a model of dignity emerges in which four variants of dignity stand out: dignity of merit, dignity as moral status, dignity of identity and Menschenwurde (the specifically human value). From this follows a discussion of how these variants of dignity can be used in characterizing the care of the elderly. The notions of dignity and dignified care are discussed particularly in relation to demented persons and dying persons. The book also contains a chapter on the dignity of the dead person. International in focus, Dignity in Care for Older People provides a contemporary discussion of the care of older people, and will be of use to qualified nurses and social care practitioners working with older people, as well as those on ethics and gerontology courses
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Dimensions of health and health promotion
- 2003
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Samlingsverk (redaktörskap) (refereegranskat)abstract
- This book contains scholarly contributions to several current debates in the philosophy of medicine and health care regarding the nature of health and health promotion, concepts and measurements of mental illness, phenomenological conceptions of health and illness, allocation of health care resources, criteria for proper medical science, the clinical meeting, and ethical constraints in such a meeting.With one exception, the authors in this book are or have been teachers or graduate students at the interdisciplinary Department of Health and Society (Tema H) at Linköping University, Sweden. While all the texts have a philosophical focus, many other disciplines have influenced the choice of specific perspectives. The university backgrounds of the authors range from medicine, psychology, sociology, and religion to philosophy. What binds the authors together is their deep interest in the theory of medicine and in the pursuit of a philosophy of humanistic medicine and health care.
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| 3. |
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| 4. |
- Furenhed, Ragnar, 1945-
(författare)
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En gåtfull verklighet : att förstå hur gravt utvecklingsstörda upplever sin värld
- 1997
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation is a qualitative study which is based upon interviews with parents and caretakers of profoundly mentally disabled people. Firstly, the dissertation analyzes the subjects' evaluation of the quality of life of the mentally disabled person. The analysis focuses upon how the intellectual disability affects thinking, emotional life and relationships. The question of the mentally disabled person's well-being is in focus here. Secondly, it is shown how people in close relationships to the mentally disabled person obtain knowledge about the person's inner life through communication with him or her and through interpreting his or her behavior and body expressions. Thirdly, the dissertation investigates how some influential theories on quality of life can contribute to an understanding of profoundly mentally disabled peoples' well-being. The dissertation concludes with a reflection upon the disabled persons' dignity.
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| 5. |
- Kjellström, Sofia
(författare)
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Ansvar, hälsa och människa : en studie av idéer om individens ansvar för sin hälsa
- 2005
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- That people should take responsibility for their health is a prominent contemporary idea. But what does such responsibility actually entail, and what demands are being put on people? The objective of the dissertation is to describe and critically examine various ideas on personal responsibility for health. In the first step, I identify and describe a wide variation of uses of responsibility and in the second step, I problematize them. The analyzed material consists of Swedish government reports and various types of health advice literature, including medical books and alternative medicine literature. I employ a framework of philosophical, social scientific, and developmental psychology theories on responsibility to critically examine the material.The study shows that taking responsibility involves both body and mind. Common ideas are that it requires maintaining a healthy lifestyle and managing one's self-care. But it is also considered important to take responsibility for beliefs and emotions and to adopt an accepting attitude. Another idea is that spiritual insights expand the scope of responsibility. Some important abilities required to take responsibility are conscious healthy choices, self-knowledge, and critical thinking. The view of responsibility is also influenced by individual factors, cultural beliefs about health and disease, and social structures. In the literature, health responsibility is regarded both as a social duty and as a never-ending task performed by an active individual.Finally, I use Robert Kegan's theory of adult development to show that taking responsibility imposes psychological demands on people's awareness. The demands are often higher than many people can manage. Some of the stress and poor health that people experience may be the product of an inability to manage all of life's demands. The developmental perspective also asserts that people can develop the requisite capacity. One conceivable conclusion of the study is that if we want people to take more responsibility, we should not only invest resources in health information, but also in measures that generate self-knowledge, reflection, and personal development.
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| 8. |
- Nordenfelt, Lennart, 1945-
(författare)
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A Defence of a Holistic Concept of Health
- 2016
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Ingår i: Naturalism in the philosophy of health. - Cham : Springer Publishing Company. - 9783319290898 - 9783319290911 ; , s. 209-225
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Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In this paper I argue for the need of a positive, value-oriented, concept of health. I call it a holistic concept in that it involves looking upon health as having to do with the person as a whole. It is the person as a whole who is healthy or ill. Ill health is here taken to be the opposite of health. A distinctive feature of holistic health is that it is not identical with the absence of diseases or injuries. A concept of this general kind exists already in many areas in society. The most notable exponent of such a concept is the World Health Organization in its many characterizations of health and related concepts. But holistic analyses of health are advocated also by significant representatives of health care and public health and indeed by many theorists of medicine and nursing. A problem with many of these analyses, however, is that they are not carefully formulated and not presented within a strict conceptual theory. I will argue that my own proposal for a theory of health can do much of the work required. The paper has the following structure. First, I take a stand with regard to conceptual analysis and its role in determining the adequacy of definitions of health. Second, I make a brief survey of crucial characterizations of holistic health, both in policy documents and in the scholarly literature. In many of these conceptions the person’s abilities and subjective experiences come to the fore. Third, I consider the use of the term health in the standard medical encounter and in the formulation of goals of medicine. Fourth, I scrutinize some arguments concerning priorities in medicine, where a holistic concept of health plays a crucial role. Finally, I will give a brief outline of my own conceptual theory of holistic health.
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| 9. |
- Nordenfelt, Lennart, 1945-
(författare)
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A new stance on quality of life
- 2018. - 1 uppl
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Ingår i: Routledge Handbook of Well-Being. - Abingdon, Oxon : Routledge. - 9781138850101 - 9781315724966 ; , s. 163-172
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Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This chapter considers the rationale for the introduction of the quality-of-life concept. Several factors have contributed to the ideological change. One of these factors is of course the technological development of medicine. Another crucial factor behind the medical discussion about quality of life was the anthropology adopted in much modern medicine. If one's life as a whole is characterized by the fact that one's most important goals are fulfilled or are in the process of becoming fulfilled, then this life is–with great probability–a life of great happiness. In public health and health care there is not only the ethical rule whereby staff shall seek to achieve the general objectives of care, health and health-related quality of life. Staff should of course show general compassion and attempt to reduce a person's suffering even if this has nothing directly to do with medicine or, in the strictest sense, nursing.
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| 10. |
- Nordenfelt, Lennart, 1945-
(författare)
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Ability, Competence and Qualification : Fundamental Concepts in the Philosophy of Disability
- 2009. - 1
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Ingår i: Philosophical Reflections on Disability. - Dordrecht : Springer. - 9789048124763 ; , s. 37-54
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Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This project draws together the diverse strands of the debate regarding disability in a way never before combined in a single volume. After providing a representative sampling of competing philosophical approaches to the conceptualization of disability as such, the volume goes on to address such themes as the complex interplay between disability and quality of life, questions of social justice as it relates to disability, and the personal dimensions of the disability experience. By explicitly locating the discussion of various applied ethical questions within the broader theoretical context of how disability is best conceptualized, the volume seeks to bridge the gap between abstract philosophical musings about the nature of disease, illness and disability found in much of the philosophy of medicine literature, on the one hand, and the comparatively concrete but less philosophical discourse frequently encountered in much of the disability studies literature. It also critically examines various claims advanced by disability advocates, as well as those of their critics. In bringing together leading scholars in the fields of moral theory, bioethics, and disability studies, this volume makes a unique contribution to the scholarly literature, while also offering a valuable resource to instructors and students interested in a text that critically examines and assesses various approaches to some of the most vexing problems in contemporary social and political philosophy.
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