Lived Experience of Self-Care in Blind Individuals: A Phenomenological Study

Blindness is a serious condition, which can affect mental balance and general organized personality of blind person. This study was carried out with the purpose of explaining the lived experience of self-care in blind individuals.
in this study, interpretive phenomenology was used to conduct the study. Through a purposeful sampling, 8 in-depth semi structured interviews were performed for 8 participants, which their duration was between 50-120 minutes. The method introduced by van Manen was used to perform the research and extract the concepts.
Analysis of the data led to three concepts, including “Being through discipline”, “independent through discipline”, and “protection of discipline”, which finally caused the appearance of the main concept, “self-care through a disciplined life”.
Blind individuals benefit from a disciplined lifestyle to have an independent life, and also expect this kind of discipline from others. Therefore, it is necessary that family members and health care providers consider the concept of disciplined life.