Abstract
The powerful contribution the arts can make to health and well-being is now well recognised, where we talk of a ‘healthy and health-creating society’ (All Party Parliamentary Group, 2017: 154). Poetry is an art-based inquiry, used in two different ways, either as an actual methodology of data analysis, by which data are synthesised by way of poetry, or as a data set of poems generated by research participants (Killingsworth Roberts et al., 2014). Poetic inquiry is described as one way to give a voice back to scientific research, and also as a valuable approach to view data, writing and conclusions from a more empathetic and creative perspective (McCulliss, 2013). Poetry may also be used to communicate data, especially in situations where the researcher wishes to impart findings to a wider audience. It is used here to help healthcare professionals caring for young people with cystic fibrosis foster a greater connectedness with the participants’ life worlds. What was unique here was the use of literature woven into the research poems. Presented here are researcher-voiced poems that are powerful, and that bring a real sense of what young people talked about when asked about the impact of cystic fibrosis on their everyday lives.
This study offers perspectives on the concept of ‘normalcy’, emerging from a larger data set that sought to explore how young people with cystic fibrosis negotiated care with healthcare professionals. Central to their idea of coping, and how they managed the many health interventions they needed to adhere to on a daily basis, young people referred to the need to be seen as ‘normal’. This need to be seen as normal is a consistent message we hear from children and young people living with a chronic health condition or disability. Young people in this study revised old norms and replaced them with strategies that continued to preserve the concept of normalcy; their illness was part of who they were, living with rather than being defined by a clinical diagnosis. So, the data begin to contribute to, and in some places contradict, what has already been described in published work. Weaving together data and the literature, the reader is immersed in real lives, and – helped by what is already known from other researchers – a picture of what ‘normal’ means to this group of young people emerges. So, what are the implications for us as nurses? As noted by the author, normalcy may serve as a positive means of coping with the burden of disease – in this case cystic fibrosis, but it could be any other long-term health condition. Presented in this way, through the use of poetry, the concept of normalcy and what it means to young people can be made more accessible and meaningful when teaching nurses and other healthcare professionals. Transformative learning is made possible through such approaches as this, enhancing a more empathic and holistic understanding of a patient population.
Poetic inquiry, similar to other mediums for qualitative research, requires a particular skill set. What constitutes good research poetry should be a shared concern. The importance of criteria for evaluating research poetry, similar to other kinds of research, is essential in order to judge both artistic and scientific concerns. Faulkner (2009) presents one such framework, to be recommended to situate creative arts techniques into our A to Z of qualitative research methods in healthcare.