Abstract
In our study that explored the current end-of-life care provision for Chinese older people with advanced/terminal cancer, hope emerged as a significant aspect of coping with their condition. Drawing on data from in-depth interviews with a group of older people, their family carers and health professionals, this article explores participants’ constructions of hope in terms of what they were hoping for, how their hopes helped them cope with their illness and what sociocultural resources they drew on to build and sustain these hopes. While acknowledging similarities to Western studies of hope in terminal illness, this article identifies significant divergences in terms of the impact of different sociocultural values and their implications for clinical practice in light of an unfavourable health care environment for patients with advanced cancer and a social support system sustained mainly by Chinese families. It argues that hope represents an important resource for coping with terminal illness among these patients.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 154-171 |
| Number of pages | 18 |
| Journal | Health |
| Volume | 19 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| Early online date | 19 Oct 2014 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Mar 2015 |
Keywords
- advanced cancer, China, hope, older people, qualitative
Access to Document
- From hope to hope- final
(C) 2015 Sage Publications. This is the author's accepted version of an article published in Chen, H, Komaromy, C & Valentine, C 2015, 'From hope to hope: the experience of older Chinese people with advanced cancer' Health, vol 19, no. 2, pp. 154-171. The published version is available via: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1363459314555238.