Rheumatic diseases have a major impact on everyday life and often leads to participation restrictions in activities. Significant others also have a big impact on everyday life, in both poitive and negative ways. Significant others are often emphasized as the biggest and most important support for functioning well in everyday life, but can also be experienced as showing lack of understanding.
How can we ensure that significant others act as the best possible support for persons with rheumatic diseases, and thereby enable the patient’s participation in everyday life? What do the patients wish? What kind of needs are the significant others requesting? With my thesis, I would like to explore how significant others can be a resource in enabling participation in the everyday lives of persons with rheumatoid arthritis (RA).
