In Suffering Narratives of Older Adults, Mary Beth Quaranta Morrissey turns to the traditions of phenomenology, humanistic psychology and social work to provide an in-depth exploration of the deep structure of the suffering experience. She draws upon the notion of maternal holding to develop an original construct of maternal affordances – the ground of possibility for human development, agency and relational practices. The conceptual analysis is based on the life narratives of several elders receiving chronic care in facility environments. Creating new fields of communication for patients, their family members and health professionals in processes of reflection and shared decision making, this book builds on knowledge about suffering to help guide ethical action in preventing and relieving chronic pain and improving systems of care. It offers a phenomenological approach to understanding the maternal as a primary domain of moral experience in serious illness and suffering, and implications for policy, practice and research. A series of applied chapters, looking at individual experiences of suffering and care experiences, present critical areas of ethical inquiry, including: pain and suffering maternal relational ethics evaluation and moral deliberation about care options decision-making and moral agency end-of-life experiences of care. Exploring how an ecological relational perspective grounded in phenomenology may provide fruitful alternatives to traditional frameworks in bioethics, this is an important contribution to the ongoing development of an ecological ethic of care. It will be of interest to scholars and students of bioethics and phenomenological methods in the health and human services, as well as practitioners in the field.

This book explores the multifaceted experience of suffering in old age. Older adults suffer from a variety of causes such as illness, loss, and life disappointment, to name a few. Suffering also occurs due to experiences related to one's gender, ethnic background, and religion. Although gerontological literature has equated suffering with depression, grief, pain and sadness, elders themselves distinguished suffering from these concepts and at the same time showed how they are linked. Narratives of suffering from community-dwelling elders are interpreted in this book, along with the personal meaning of suffering that lies within each narrative.

Person-centred health care is increasingly endorsed as a key element of high-quality care, yet, in practice, it often means patient-centred health care. This book scrutinizes the principle of primacy of patient welfare, which, although deeply embedded in health professionalism, is long overdue for critical analysis and debate. It appears incontestable because patients have greater immediate health needs than clinicians and the patient-clinician encounter is often recognized as a moral enterprise as well as a service contract. However, Buetow argues that the implication that clinician welfare is secondary can harm clinicians, patients and health system performance. Revaluing participants in health care as moral equals, this book advocates an ethic of virtue to respect the clinician as a whole person whose self-care and care from patients can benefit both parties, because their moral interests intertwine and warrant equal consideration. It then considers how to move from values including moral equality in health care to practice for people in their particular situations. Developing a genuinely inclusive concept of person-centred care – accepting clinicians as moral equals – it also facilitates the coalescence of patient-centred care and evidence-based health care. This reflective and provocative work develops a constructive alternative to the taken-for-granted principle of primacy of patient welfare. It is of interest to students and academics in the health and caring sciences, philosophy, ethics, medical humanities and health management.

With more people living longer lives, there is increased importance in the health care industry on improving services for the elderly. This comprehensive book gives an expert overview of the topics and challenges, along with imperative ethical and legal frameworks. The book also details existing programs and benefits in relation to a realistic portrayal of population needs. Other important issues are covered such as long-term palliative care and hospice, other vulnerable populations, elder abuse, public-private collaboration, evidence-based policy-making, and much more.

This book covers the essentials of psychotherapeutic work with older adults, discussing how contemporary psychodynamic thought can be applied clinically to engage the older patient in psychotherapeutic work of depth and meaning, work that not only relieves suffering but also promotes growth. It describes the way the difficulties accompanying older age can affect psychological functioning and it examines the unique psychotherapeutic needs of this age group. Using clinical vignettes for illustrative purposes, it explores the psychotherapeutic challenges, tasks, techniques and accomplishments involved in the treatment of older adults. Topics discussed include the reemergence of earlier developmental challenges; the concurrent treatment of late life and revived early trauma; transference and countertransference; the functions of developing an enriched life narrative in restoring the self; existential issues; and mourning. Throughout, the focus is on what psychotherapy can do to help. The demand for mental health services for older adults is growing alongside increasing life spans, but the psychodynamic literature has neglected this population. Blooming in December: Psychodynamic Psychotherapy with Older Adults fills this gap, offering a clear guide to effective work with older adults for all psychotherapists and psychoanalysts.

As digital life stories continue to assume more and more significance across a range of institutions, so too does their potential to bring into focus once marginalised and neglected voices. Breaking new ground by reframing multimedia life stories as a resource for education, public health, and policy, this book challenges policymakers, professionals, and researchers to reimagine how they find out about and respond to people’s daily lives and experiences of health, disability, and well-being. The book develops theoretical, methodological, and practical resources for listening to digital stories through a series of carefully selected international case studies, from dementia care education to campaigns in the UN to ban cluster munitions. The case studies explore and illuminate different ways that digital stories have – and have not – been listened to in the past. The authors expose the great potential as well as the complexity of using powerful personal stories in practice. Together, the case studies highlight that processes of listening to, learning from, and making use of digital stories involve unavoidable processes of reinterpretation, recontextualisation, and translation which have significant ethical and political implications for storytellers, listeners, and society. In mapping and theorising the movement of stories into new contexts of policy and practice, the book offers a critical lens on the widely celebrated democratising potential of digital storytelling and its capacity to amplify marginalised voices. Digital Storytelling in Health and Social Policy develops an authoritative and original re-conceptualisation of digital life stories and their use for social justice ends, and will be important reading for researchers and practitioners from a range of backgrounds, including social policy, digital media, communication, education, disability, and public health.

Exploring phenomenological philosophy as it relates to psychiatry and the social world, this book establishes a common language between psychiatrists, anti-psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers. Phenomenology and the Social Context of Psychiatry is an inter-disciplinary work by phenomenological philosophers, psychiatrists, and psychologists to discover the essence and foundations of social psychiatry. Using the phenomenology of Husserl as a point of departure, the meanings of empathy, interpersonal understanding, we-intentionality, ethics, citizenship and social inclusion are investigated in relation to psychopathology, nosology, and clinical research. This work, drawing upon the rich classical and contemporary phenomenological tradition, touching on a broad range of thinkers such as Deleuze, Levinas, and R.D. Laing, also explicates how phenomenology is a method capable of capturing the human condition and its intricate relation to the social world and mental illness