Meaning behind illness: emotional healing among asthma patients

Background: The presence of disease is often responded and interpreted subjectively. The interaction between the patients and the disease may bring the meaning of disease to the patients, which has impacted on the health status. Objective: The research was aimed to observe disease interpretation on the asthma patients during their healing process. Materials and Methods: We used the qualitative phenomenological method in this research. The data were collected by the in-depth interviews, observations, documentation, and field notes from 20 people as the subjects. Result: We obtained that each subject interpreted the disease differently. Therefore, it was classified into two of eight of interpreting the disease categories. Group I interpreted the disease positively, while Group II interpreted the disease negatively. Positive interpretation toward the disease could enhance the recovery. Meanwhile, negative interpretation toward the disease could slow down in the healing process. The condition could be seen when the subjects interpreted positively to their disease and illness. The subjects’ attitudes and behaviors either positive or negative are the manifestations of emotion. The emotion plays a role in controlling the subjects’ mindset and behavior. Apparently, the subjects enabling to regulate the positive emotion which is based on high spirituality can reduce the recurrence rate of asthma, which eventually has impacted on physical health, psychological, social, and spiritual. Conclusion: The interpretation toward the disease had a correlation to the healing process