In today’s podcast, Sarah speaks with Maddie Gravelle about her research into the consequences of illness uncertainty for Lyme disease patients. Maddie is a student and researcher at Queen’s University in Kingston. She shifted her research focus from cancer to Lyme disease after witnessing the challenges her mother faced in dealing with both of these diseases. Her mother noticed that some aspects of Lyme disease were more challenging when compared to similar aspects of dealing with cancer. When Maddie discovered that there was very little research regarding the psychological effects of Lyme disease, she decided to make that her research focus.

Maddie describes four different types of illness uncertainty that patients can be faced with as described in Mishel’s Illness Uncertainty Theory. She points out that many Lyme patients are faced with uncertainty in the areas of diagnosis, ambiguity around the disease, unpredictability and complex healthcare experiences. She highlights some of the many uncertainties that Lyme patients are faced with, not only in relation to the complex and unpredictable nature of the disease, but also as a result of “complex healthcare experiences” that many Lyme patients deal with.

Read the show notes