Living with a machine : the experience of the child who is ventilator-dependent

Children who are ventilator dependent have been living at home for some time now. Current research has considered home care to be the most appropriate environment for care of technology-dependent children with special health care needs. Research also has revealed much about the families who care for the children, the therapeutic management of their care and the efficacy of home care. No studies, however, have explored the experience of the child who has special needs, specifically those children who are ventilator dependent. There is an absence of first-hand knowledge about the experience of the children. The purpose of this study was to describe the experience of the child who is ventilator-dependent. Interviews completed with nine children, using the phenomenological approach described by Pollio, Henley and Thompson ( 1997) and Thomas and Pollio (2002), yielded rich data from verbatim transcripts of the interview recordings and were interpreted by the researcher and the phenomenological research group in its weekly meetings.