Caring science with a foundation in “the lived experience” may be viewed as a “patient science” i.e. the nursing has its starting point in the patient’s perspective. To support the students to learn caring science, the learning situation has to embrace the students’ lived experience in relation to the substance of caring science. One of the challenges in education is how to make the theoretical meanings more vivid, when there are no patients present. To obtain lived experiences as a foundation for teaching, written patient narratives and fiction like novels in combination with scientific literature are often used. Questions about how film can be used in this context to support learning of caring science have recently emerged.

The aim of this study was to describe how film as learning-support may boost reflection in learning caring science. The data was collected through audio-taped seminars, written reflections and group-interviews with students on basic-, advanced-, and doctoral levels. The analysis was based on the Reflective Lifeworld Research (RLR) approach, founded on phenomenology.

The result shows how film as a learning-support enhances the understanding of the caring science theory, and gives a deeper understanding of the subject. Film can be very touching and supportive for the students’ embodied reflections. Hence, it is important that the students are encouraged to watch the film from a caring science perspective and this requires a structure for learning-support related to the film, such as focus and purposes of watching the film, as well as support for follow-ups. The film per se does not create such support and guidance, but must be combined with well considered pedagogic thoughts on what learning is and how learning can be supported. The result is highlighted with the help of Maurice Merleau-Pontys philosophy of “the lived body”, and “the flesh of the world”.