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Much research exists on quality of life issues with breast cancer survivors. However, there has been little done on the waiting experience itself, and on the experience of follow-up from the women's perspective. Women who have been diagnosed and treated for breast cancer live with the condition for a minimum of 5 years, waiting for the next medical intervention; waiting for the next battery of tests; waiting for the next physician check-up. Throughout most of these years they may feel healthy, but they experience visits to cancer clinics, medical testing, and physician interactions. Women's accounts of their experiences of waiting and life during follow-up for breast cancer has not been the focus of research on the quality of life of breast cancer survivors. In particular research that uses a qualitative approach, in which women recount their experiences in their own language, has been missing. This study used a phenomenological approach, telling the stories of waiting and life throughout follow-up of nine women. The women's experiences are captured in four themes: life-changing; a sense of belonging; uncertainty; needing to know.
Keywords: breast cancer; cancer
Women with breast cancer are faced with a long period of medical and health interventions. Once they recover from the shock associated with receiving a potentially life-threatening diagnosis, surgery, and the illness associated with most cancer treatment, their physical well-being manifests itself. However, they continue to undergo frequent medical tests and examinations for a prolonged period of time. They continue to wait for medical appointments and test results, as they wait through their Year-5 transition to being cured. The concept of waiting, in this study, includes more than waiting for appointments, or waiting for test results. It is founded in the notion that for a 5- to 6-year period, cancer survivors' whole lives are in waiting mode. They are waiting as they live through the years of follow-up activity: waiting to be declared cancer free.
Much research has been done on quality of life issues with cancer survivors. The concept of quality of life is still being redefined in light of these studies, the majority of which use quantitative methods and result in numerical data. There has been little done on the follow-up experience itself, particularly using a phenomenological approach whereby...