Evaluation Stages

Patients' evaluations unfolded through four non-linear stages. In the meaning-reconstruction stage, patients adapt surgical outcomes into a new sense of normal life. The contradiction-coexistence stage is characterized by simultaneous benefits and burdens without either fully dominating. In the contradiction-persistence stage, evaluations fluctuate as benefits and burdens alternate in importance. In the burden-dominant stage, discomfort or severe symptoms overshadowed perceived benefits.