Celebrating Our Nurses – Jennifer Oaten

2020 is the International Year of the Nurse and Midwife. The World Health Assembly could not have chosen a better year to celebrate the women and men who are the heart and soul of our health system. Never have they been more important.

Pandemic aside, nurses provide care for us throughout our lives. They are there when we are born, when we have immunisations, when we are ill and when we have broken bones. They are there when we need scans, stitches or surgery or when we are facing the challenges of cancer. In old age and at the end of our lives, our nurses are always there to support and care for us.

The founding of modern nursing

The English woman credited with founding modern nursing was Florence Nightingale (1820 – 1910). She was a social reformer and statistician. From a young age, she excelled in mathematics and was able to read and write French, German, Italian, Greek, and Latin. At 16, she had a “calling from God” to help reduce human pain and suffering. For Florence, nursing seemed the best pathway to serve both God and humankind.

During the Crimean War, Florence wandered the wards at night, providing support for the patients. This earned her the title of “the Lady with the Lamp”. It also earned her profession great respect from the soldiers, and in turn, society.

During the war, Nightingale saw firsthand that the majority of men did not die from wounds sustained in battle. They died as a result of infections stemming from squalid conditions, so she endeavoured to take action.

Nightingale knew advancing the nursing profession was critical to improving healthcare. She worked tirelessly throughout her life to establish standards of care, and to develop educational programs for nurses. Nightingale changed the face of nursing from a mostly untrained profession to a highly skilled and well-respected medical profession with important responsibilities.