A ground theory approach on fatigue of the female elderly with osteoarthritis

관절염을 앓고 있는 노인 여성 피로 경험의 근거 이론적 접근

The purpose of this study was to identify and construct a substantive theory about the experience of fatigue among the female elderly with osteoarthritis. The interviewees were 6 female elderly with osteoarthritis. Of them 3 were admitted General hospital, the remaining 3 didn't admitted hospital. The data were collected through in-depth interviews by the investigators from May 20th, 1995 to June 19th, 1995. The collected data were coded into concepts and categories according to Strauss & Corbin's grounded method. The data thus collected were analyzed immediatly after interviews and fed into next round of interviews until the data collection reaches the saturation point where no additional concepts emerge. The 35 concepts were from analyzing the grounded data. The results of this study were as follows : 'change of the health condition','change of the life pattern', 'physiologic change', 'change of the coping pattern', 'performance of homework', 'activity daily living', 'tireness', 'ache', 'change of general apperance', 'sleep disturbance', 'powerlessness'. 'Physiologic unbalance', 'change of the family dynamics', 'physical imbalance', 'loss of the control', aviodance', 'conversion', 'leaving', 'indifference', 'hesitation', 'the pursue of information and trial', 'the western therapy', 'heat therapy', 'the oriental therapy','exercise', 'weight control', 'support', 'solution', 'being as before', 'adding more'. Six categories emerged from the analysis of ground data. They were as follows : 'stimuli', 'fatigue', 'passive coping', 'active coping', 'disolution', 'remains'. 13 hypothesis were derived from the integration of categories as follows : 1. The stronger the stimulus as perceived by the subjects, the more the fatigue will exrerience. 2. The more severe the fatigue, the more severe the tireness. 3. The more severe the fatigue, the more the hardness. 4. The more severe the fatigue, the more the variability of appear will experience. 5. The more severe the fatigue, the more the pain will experience. 6. The more severe the fatigue, the more the insomnia will experience. 7. The more severe the fatigue, the more the powerless will experience. 8 The more severe the fatigue, the more the psychological unbalance will experience. 9. The more severe the fatigue, the more variability of the family dynamics will experience. 10. The more severe the fatigue, the more the physical unbalance will experience. 11. The more severe the fatigue, the more loss of control will experience. 12. The subjects who experienced the fatigue will be to show passive coping and active coping mechanism.