This article discusses how existential phenomenology may serve as a frame in a mixed‐methods study of changes in weight and body composition among women in adjuvant treatment for breast cancer. In accordance with ontologically and epistemologically fundamental assumptions in nursing, we link mixed‐methods and existential phenomenology from the perspective of the French philosopher Maurice Merleau‐Ponty and his notion of a unified body subject. Letting this perspective permeate our philosophy, methodology and issues at the method level in mixed‐method research undermines the (...) distinction between first‐ and third‐person perspective when applying and integrating different data sources in a mixed‐methods study. Applying Merleau‐Ponty's third way, the women's bodily experiences appear as gestalt; a ‘figure’ against a ground of existential threats that are grasped through insight from data integrating in joint displays, which revealed the women's experiences on a deep existential level. Existential phenomenology as a frame in mixed‐method studies can speak not only to nurses but also to a multidisciplinary audience in a shared attempt to deepen the understanding of a patient's healthcare problem. (shrink)

In some quarters within philosophy of medicine, more particularly in the phenomenological approaches, naturalism is looked upon with suspicion. This paper argues, first, that it is necessary to distinguish between two expressions of this attitude towards naturalism: phenomenological approaches to illness disagree with naturalism regarding various theoretical claims and they disapprove of naturalism on an ethical level. Second, this paper argues that both the disagreement with and the disapproval of naturalism are to a large extent confused. It then offers some (...) proposals to set up an agenda for future collaboration. (shrink)