Contribution to nursing
Florence Nightingale was a nurse that contributed historical advancement of the profession. Florence was an Italian born in the year 1820 when she was 5 years old; she studies in German, French and Italian where she was provided a classical education by her father. For Nightingale passion was not only a career but also a call she used the call by helping poor and ill people in her village. In the Lutheran Hospital in Kaiserswerth Germany Nightingale pursues her nursing career. Therefore, in a Middlesex hospital in London Nightingale took a nursing job for ailing governess in the early 1850s. Within a year of Nightingale being hired, she was promoted to superintendent because her performance impressed her employer. Nightingale reduced the number of death by two-third during the Crimean War in British base hospital. In the year 1860, Nightingale founded a school for nurse training which called St. Thomas Hospital and she later died in the year 1910 in London (Gill, 2004).
Major social issues occurred at the time Florence Nightingale lived
At the time Nightingale lived, racism was a major social issue occurred. Racism occurred when Mrs. Seacole a black woman from Jamaica rallied spot about the minority of feminist nurses were restricted. Black nurses complained of the racism in the National Health Services whereby they make use of Mrs. Seacole’s word to express their feeling of anger, discrimination and rejection due to racist (Bassett, 1992). Another social issue occurred in the time of Nightingale was unemployment. Well able people who could able to deal with nursing were unemployed which was a major problem in the workhouse. A large number of nurses who were employed were old age, mental illness and disability which make them weak to do their jobs (McDonald, 2010).
Contribution made to nursing by Nightingale
The two greatest contributions made by Nightingale to nursing are the reform of hospitals and the pioneering of nursing. These two contributions from Nightingale were influential as it is compared to other women’s contribution to her age group. Nightingale founded a training school for nurses which was the commemorate of Nightingale. This revered to Nightingale’s contribution of the pioneering of nursing (Singh, & Ernst, 2008). When Nightingale was in the Crimea she observed the poor conditions of the hospital which were filthy, plumbing and sewer drainage was blocked which cause fleas and rats were everywhere which causes a lot of diseases. Nightingale worked on and improved the condition of the hospital and buildings surrounded the hospital in Crimea to lower the diseases caused by filthy. Nightingale took a role to operate a sewer in the hospital and to purify water in order to ensure soldiers’ condition was well. This donation contributes to reform of hospital to nursing (Audain, 2004).
How these unique contributions influenced nursing as we know it today
According to Gill (2004), the two unique contributions from Nightingale influenced nursing by making them improve the quality of healthcare and effectiveness of patient care today as the guidelines show from healthcare reform. Improvement of hospitals today influences nursing today by the construction of single rooms to create space and privacy of a patient. This shows how pioneering of hospitals influenced nursing today. Spiegelhalter (1999) implies that heath care today are improving on hygiene and sanitation to lower the cause of diseases such as cholera and typhoid among other and this shows how nursing was influenced by the unique contributions made by Florence Nightingale.
References
Bassett, C. (192). 'Mary Seacole: The forgotten founder'. Nursing Standard, (6) 44-45.
McDonald, L. (2010). Florence Nightingale A Hundred Years On: Who She Was and What She Was Not. Retrieved from http://www.uoguelph.ca/~cwfn/short/whr.htm.
Audain, C. (2004). Florence Nightingale. Retrieved from http://www.agnesscott.edu/riddle/women/ nitegale.htm
Spiegelhalter, D. J. (1999) Surgical audit: statistical lessons from Nightingale and Codman. J R Statist (162) 45–58.
Gill, G. (2004). Nightingales: the Extraordinary Upbringing and Curious Life of Miss Florence Nightingale. New York: Ballantine Books.
Singh, S. & Ernst, E. (2008). Trick or Treatment? Bantam Press, London.
