ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on learning from the experience of frail and vulnerable patients with one particular condition, a fractured hip, during their pathway of care from admission through to discharge into the community. The quality of care provided along this pathway has traditionally been considered from a clinical viewpoint, but this does not take into account the patient's own views on the care delivered to them and the outcomes they expect from it. In order to take forward patient experience as an essential aspect of quality healthcare, new approaches to capture that experience are required. Hermeneutics is one such approach which helps clinicians to understand the uniqueness of individual patients, their meanings and their interactions with others, such as carers and family members, and their environment. An awareness of where hip fracture patients are in their process of recovery will help clinicians establish a plan of care and set realistic goals with them.
