The dyspnea experience: nociceptive properties and a model for research and practice.
Dyspnea has been defined as the unpleasant sensation of difficult breathing and the reaction to that sensation. Dyspnea research, however, has largely used a unidimensional, sensory model of dyspnea devoid of the affective and motivational dimensions that uniquely characterize this sensation in clinical populations. Dyspnea might be more comprehensively viewed as a nociceptive phenomenon which, like pain, has affective dimensions expressed as distress in response to aversiveness. A multidimensional, ecologic model of the dyspnea experience is presented that incorporates nociceptive sensation properties and is suggestive of new directions for dyspnea research uniquely relevant to nursing science.
Steele
B
B
Department of Psychosocial Nursing, University of Washington, Seattle.
Shaver
J
J
D004417:Dyspnea / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000451:nursing / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004463:Ecology; D006801:Humans; D016294:Models, Nursing; D009619:Nociceptors / Q000502:physiology*; D015399:Nursing Research / Q000592:standards; D012307:Risk Factors; D011984:Sensory Receptor Cells / Q000502:physiology*