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Patients' Experiences in Inviting Healthcare Persons Into Caring Relationships: A Thematic Analysis.
Marja Leena Portaankorva1,2,3, Anne Kasén4, Lisbeth Fagerström1
1Faculty of Science and Engineering, Department of Nature and Health Sciences, Åbo Akademi University, Vaasa, Finland.
Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences
|April 20, 2026
Summary
Patients initiate relationships with healthcare providers to foster understanding of their suffering. Their active engagement, or lack thereof, influences the depth of the patient-provider connection and requires careful attention from clinicians.
Area of Science:
- Healthcare communication
- Patient-provider relationships
- Qualitative research
Background:
- Physicians and nurses typically initiate patient relationships.
- Little research exists on patients initiating these relationships.
- Patient invitations can be overlooked.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore patients' experiences inviting healthcare providers into the caring relationship.
- To understand how patients initiate and develop relationships with healthcare providers.
Main Methods:
- Qualitative approach using semi-structured interviews.
- 20 adult outpatients participated.
- Inductive thematic analysis of interview data.
Main Results:
- Patients actively invited healthcare providers through human-to-human interaction.
- Patients advocated for themselves when their suffering was not understood.
- Patients expressed suffering to be seen and understood, and experienced this when achieved.
Conclusions:
- Patient invitations aim for deeper understanding of their suffering.
- Responsiveness to initial invitations impacts patient engagement.
- Healthcare providers face an ethical imperative to recognize all patient invitations, even non-verbal ones.
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