The purpose of this study was to understand the nature and structure of "uncertainty of chronically ill patients" by explaining it more scientifically. This study is based on the unique experiences, which individual uncertainty experiences differ from others. In this sense, Q-methodology which includes self-psychology and abductive logics is applied to the study. The results indicate that there are six types of uncertainty of chronically ill patients : my own fault, self-esteem loss, self-care determination, cure-doubt, reality-restructure, and past-tenacity reality-absence. Thus,"uncertainty of chronically ill patients"is defined from the study as the process in which continuous transition and evaluation of possibility cause changes in human recognition, attitude, action, etc.. The significance of the study is threefold : (1) discovery of six types of uncertainty of chronically ill patients in Korean people, (2) the better understanding of "uncertainty of chronically ill patients", (3) possible developments of nursing concept and assessment and intervention technique based on the new dimension of the understanding in uncertainty for nursing of chronically ill patients from this research.
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