Patterns of 'balancing between hope and despair' in the diagnostic phase: a grounded theory study of patients on a gastroenterology ward.

Aim: The aim of the study was to learn how patients going through the diagnostic phase experienced and handled their situation.

Background: Many studies report about the stressful diagnostic phase; however, none has presented a conceptual theory where the concepts are sufficiently related to each other. The Theory of Preparative Waiting has previously been published as a descriptive grounded theory and describes the experience of a group of gastroenterology patients going through the diagnostic phase.