Digital Commons Network^™

Rediscovering The Asylum, Sharon M. Keigher

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Spending a night at a typical big city shelter for the homeless has reminded the author of the massive and regimented environment in institutions that she had mistakenly believed no longer existed after the much acclaimed "deinstitutionalization" of America. St. Mary's is run by a religious order attempting to provide charitable care in a nondemanding environment. Many demands are made, however. The lack of privacy and respect for individuality inherent in institutional life tends to erode the "inmate's" very conception of self. It controls their activities, time, and choices, and thus creates barriers to exit. Providing "shelter" for the homeless …

What's Happening: November 18, 1992, Maine Medical Center

What's Happening

No abstract provided.

What's Happening: January 29, 1992, Maine Medical Center

What's Happening

No abstract provided.

A Suffering Odyssey: A Phenomenological-Interpretive Analysis, William M. Scott

Legacy ETDs

The purpose of this study is to explicate how suffering is experienced and interpreted by sufferers. Nursing and medical literature, until quite recently, has been visibly bereft on the topic of human suffering. The subject is made even more confusing because of a lack of a standardized definition: By its very essence, suffering is a relative experience, highly personalized and intimately interpreted. In the past, it has been related to mental anguish, injury, loss, stress, and pain.

Five individuals from contextually different regions of the world were asked to share their suffering stories. Two lived in the southern coastal area …