Emiko Endo

<p>Abstract</p><p>The purpose of this study is to analyze the practical nursing care for the patients with cancer pain performed by the expert nurses, and to identify a relation between the intrinsic practical knowing and four patterns of Carper's knowing. Pain relieving care performed by six expert nurses was studied by perticipant observations and interviews to analyze their practice. It was known that 15 patterns of the practical knowing extracted from the pain relieving care performed by the expert nurses, were classified into four patterns of Carper's knowing, i.e. empirical-, aesthetic-, personal-, ethical knowing, respectively. Simultaneously, they were overlapping and integrated into the practical knowing. </p><p>The result of this study revealed that the superior practice of the experts in pain relieving care for the patients with cancer was deeply related to the intuition, knowing on an expert oneself, and sensibility to ethical topics ; it means so-called Carper's patterns of aesthetic-, personal-, and ethical knowing respectively. It was suggested that for excellent practice of the nursing care, not only the empirical knowing but also other patterns of knowing are important, and it is necessary to sense up all four knowing patterns.</p>