O sentido atribuído à experiência da comunicação do diagnóstico de câncer nos discursos de pessoas idosas sob a ótica do pensamento de Merleau-Ponty e Heidegger

Abstract

This research is part of the field of Psychology of Health and the research line Psychology and Phenomenology, FAPSI / UFAM / CNPq Laboratory of Phenomenological-Existential Psychology. The object of study was the experience of elderly people diagnosed with chronic diseases. The experience of communicating the diagnosis of a chronic disease implies a series of emotional issues that mobilize the person affected to question existence itself. Cancer is an example of a chronic health condition that has a progressive and incapacitating course, which constitutes a public health problem and enforces a huge challenge for the patient's psychosocial assistance and adjustment. This study aimed to understand the meaning attributed to the experience of communicating the diagnosis of cancer in the discourses of elderly people from the point of view of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger's thinking. It is a study based on the qualitative research approach, using the phenomenological method of research in Psychology with a descriptive, retrospective and exploratory character, from the theoretical perspective of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger. A recorded audio phenomenological interview was used, based on a guiding question, with its possible unfolding after being enunciated. Twenty-one elderly people accompanied by a reference institution in the treatment of cancer in Manaus participated in the study. The analysis of the interviews followed the subsequent script: full and literal transcription of the interviews, identification of Units of Meaning, transformation of the Meaning Units in psychological character, elaboration of Thematic Categories. About the speeches five categories were elaborated: The communication of the diagnosis: the process initiates; Post-diagnosis: changes and transformations (or not) in the daily life and in the family; The confrontation: my possibility as a human in the face of illness; The treatment: perception of the institution and the multiprofessional team; Reflections about my history, my life, my journey in the world of disease.It is deduced that walking through the disease is a phenomenon that extends beyond the diagnosis communication; each phase of the process has meanings and senses that deserve the attention of all who are involved, considering factors used as coping and the way of being of the elderly in the treatment in the post-diagnosis, besides situations varied in their daily life worthy of reflection. The corporeity is resized according to the stages that the person experiences and the sphere of Care is experienced in the relationship with oneself and with the other.