Patients as 'safeguard' and nurses as 'substitute' in home health care

One aim of this study was to explore the role, or subject position, patients take in the care they receive from nurses in their own home. Another was to examine the subject position that patients say the nurses take when giving care to them in their own home. Ten interviews were analysed and interpreted according to a discourse analytical method. The findings show that patients constructed their subject position as 'safeguard', and the nurses' subject position as 'substitute' for themselves. These subject positions provided the opportunities, and the obstacles, for the patients' possibilities to receive care in their home. The subject positions described have ethical repercussions and illuminate that the patients put great demands on tailored care.