Comprehensive health seeking and coping paradigm.

While scholars in nursing are charged with the responsibility of advancing and structuring a body of knowledge for application in nursing practice, many of the currently utilized theories have been borrowed from other disciplines. Until such knowledge is redefined and synthesized according to the perspective of nursing, borrowed knowledge cannot be adequately understood. The purpose of this paper is to present a comprehensive client-orientated health seeking and coping paradigm. This paradigm is theorized to be a function of 12 factors which include: clients' situational and personal factors, resources, sociodemographic characteristics, cognitive appraisal, health goals, health seeking and coping behaviours, nursing goals and strategies, clients' perceived compliance, clients' perceived coping effectiveness, and immediate and long-term health outcome. The Lazarus Schema of Coping and Adaptation and the Schlotfeldt Health Seeking and Coping Paradigm were the parent conceptualizations from which the Comprehensive Health Seeking and Coping Paradigm (CHSCP) was derived. As a nursing-orientated multidimensional framework, the CHSCP will provide a useful framework for nurses interested in altering, enhancing or promoting the health seeking and coping of clients. By providing an intellectual focus for the initial and ongoing assessment of a multitude of variables which influence health seeking and coping, the specification of appropriate strategies can be developed and enhanced.