Behind closed doors – the lived experience of caring for patients in the perioperative setting.

Abstract

Background There is an extensive literature base that researchers and practitioners can use to gain guidance and an understanding of the technical aspects of care in the perioperative setting. However, this focus can risk overshadowing the value of more subjective human ideas around care. This research aimed to better understand the lived experience of caring for patients in the perioperative setting. Methods Giorgi’s descriptive phenomenological method was used. Seven perioperative staff were interviewed in-depth and asked to describe their lived experience of care in a perioperative setting. Their verbatim transcripts were analysed using Giorgi’s method of analysis. Findings The general structure of perioperative care means accepting patients into an unfamiliar, alien environment as fictive kin. Within this sense of caring and being cared for, the usual human freedoms are silently handed over, with unconsciousness severing any final freedoms. In response, staff become custodians of their kin and their body. This custodianship places the highest level of responsibility on staff who know how to care with skill, morals, and ownership to protect the person who has lost freedoms with dignified care. Custodianship is transient. Some staff may transfer custodianship to others, but ultimately, there is an aim to return the body back to the patient. Constituent Parts include: (1) your patient and you: fictive kinship, (2) custodian of the body and the person, (3) knowing what to do, (4) making decisions about the patient without the patient. Conclusion This novel description, including custodianship care within healthcare practice, can focus further research, contribute to education design, guide perioperative practitioners, inform new standards/best practices and unveil secrecy for patients. This study helped to make aspects which were implicit into something explicit so that the human elements of caring can be recognised and celebrated.