Introduction: A Phenomenological Approach. One: The Separate Worlds of Physician and Patient. 1. Own World. 2. Common World. 3. Different Perspectives of Physician and Patient. 4. Implications for Medical Practice. Two: Illness. 1. Levels of Constitution of Meaning. 2. The Patient's Apprehension of Illness. 3. The Physician's Apprehension of the Patient's Illness. 4. Implications for Medical Practice. Three: The Body. 1. The Lived Body. 2. Body as Object. 3. Lived Body in Illness. 4. Body as Object in Illness. 5. The Body-as-Scientific-Object. 6. Implications for Medical Practice. Four: The Healing Relationship. 1. Illness-as-Lived. 2. Empathic Understanding. 3. Clinical Narrative. 4. The Healing Relationship. Bibliography. Index.

This work provides a phenomenological account of the experience of illness and the manner in which meaning is constituted by the patient and the physician. The author provides a detailed account of the way in which illness and body are apprehended differently by doctor and patient. This title has been awarded the first Edwin Goodwin Ballard Prize in Phenomenology.