“It’s like having an evil twin”: an interpretative phenomenological analysis of the lifeworld of a person with Parkinson’s disease

Abstract

Background

This paper offers an understanding of the lifeworld of a person with Parkinson’s Disease derived from interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA).

Aims

The paper has two main aims: firstly, to demonstrate how a focus on individual experience chimes with and can inform current ideas of a more personalised humanised form of healthcare for people living with Parkinson’s disease; and secondly, to demonstrate how an IPA study can illuminate particularity whilst being able to make, albeit cautiously, more general knowledge claims that can inform wider caring practices.

Methods

It achieves these aims through the detailed description and interpretation of one person’s experience of living with Parkinson's disease using the IPA approach.

Results

Three analytic themes point to how the various constituents of the lifeworld, such as embodiment, selfhood, temporality and relationality are made manifest. These enable the IPA researcher to make well-judged inferences, which can have value beyond the individual case.

Conclusions

A key feature of IPA is its commitment to an idiographic approach that recognises the value of understanding a situated experience from the perspective of a particular person or persons.

Keywords

case study chronic illness compassionate care lifeworld older people phenomenology qualitative

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