Nursing and the Public Health Legacies of the Russian Revolution.

The centenary of the October Revolution in 1917 provides a timely opportunity to assess the legacies of that event. I examine the role of the revolution in public health with a focus on nursing, assessing the Imperial Russian health care system, the development of Soviet nursing, and current plans for nursing and public health care in Putin's Russia. Analyzing nursing shows that there was a great deal of continuity in terms of medical personnel and ideas on how public health care service in Russia should operate. Nursing illuminates some of the complexities of Soviet health care and ideology, particularly the state's desire to create a socialist form of nursing in theory, despite the strong links with the prerevolutionary past in the form of personnel. This situation changed after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when the new Russian state attempted to sever connections with the past, this time with the Soviet past. But as I show, making a clean break with the past is a difficult and often fraught process.

Cornerstone Documents, Milestones, and Policies: Shaping the Direction of Public Health Nursing 1890-1950.

The interplay of policy, milestone events, and cornerstone documents was critical in the evolution of the specialty of public health nursing (PHN) from 1890-1950. Using our contemporary lens, this article examines PHN development from an historical perspective, including events and milestones driving growth in the early 20th century. Some of the challenges faced by our founding public health nursing leadership are not unlike challenges we face today. In 1950, Ruth Hubbard, a former leader in the National Organization of Public Health Nurses and Director of the Visiting Nurse Society of Philadelphia, spoke of the value of examining the past to forge a new future. This article calls for contemporary public health nurses to act upon the lessons learned from the past, to strengthen the renewed focus on prevention, to develop policies that impact population health, and to foster a vision that will guide us into the future.

"Something must be done!": public health nursing education in the United States from 1900 to 1950.

This article examines public health nursing (PHN) education in the United States from 1900 to 1950. Following establishment of district nursing and the Henry Street Settlement in the late 1800s, nurses worked with families and communities in schools, homes, and with immigrant populations in tenements of industrialized cities. By the early 1900s, PHN leaders recognized that graduates needed broader education than provided by hospital training schools to prepare nurses to address social conditions and promote health and hygiene for populations. Current themes in professional nursing, such as social determinants of health, have their roots in early discourse about PHN education.

Eugenics in the community: gendered professions and eugenic sterilization in Alberta, 1928-1972.

Scholarship on Alberta's Sexual Sterilization Act (1928-1972) has focused on the high-level politics behind the legislation, its main administrative body, the Eugenics Board, and its legal legacy, overlooking the largely female-dominated professions that were responsible for operating the program outside of the provincial mental health institutions. This paper investigates the relationship between eugenics and the professions of teaching, public health nursing, and social work. It argues that the Canadian mental hygiene and eugenics movements, which were fundamentally connected, provided these professions with an opportunity to maintain and extend their professional authority.

Cultivating constituencies: the story of the East Harlem Nursing and Health Service, 1928-1941.

I examine the history of the East Harlem Nursing and Health Service in New York City from its beginnings as a demonstration project in 1922 to its closing in 1941. I explore the less tangible goals, needs, and ambitions of the many different constituents that paid for, delivered, and received health care services. I place these goals, needs, and ambitions as critically important drivers of ultimate success or failure. The East Harlem Nursing and Health Service gained international fame among public health leaders for its innovative and independent nursing practice and teaching. However, it ultimately failed because its commitment was to a particular disciplinary mission that did not meet the needs of the constituent communities it served. From 1928 to 1941, the service focused more on the educational advancement of public health nursing and less on addressing the real health care needs of those in East Harlem.

The nurse's first visit. 1918.

Home visiting was an important component of the Public Health Nurse's (PHN) role in the early twentieth century. In this reprint, originally published in 1918 and reprinted in 1926, Edna Foley discusses the significance of the first visit the PHN makes to a family. Critical themes in the paper include the importance of first impressions, communication and observation skills, obtaining the statistical data needed by the agency and collaboration with other community social service agencies. Many of the themes and strategies discussed by Foley are cogent to PHNs and visiting nurses in the contemporary health care arena.

Health insurance in California, its effect on public health nursing.

Health insurance coverage and the means by which it is paid have been topics of intense interest in recent years, but in the United States, creation of a uniform system for provision of medical care has been debated for nearly a century. During the Great Depression, before large group insurance plans, workers who formerly had been able to adequately support their families found themselves without employment or in low income jobs that barely put food on the table and a roof over their heads. Medical care was a luxury they could not afford. Health professionals suffered the effects of the economy too. Published in Public Health Nursing in 1936, this paper reflects a time period when the ravages of the Great Depression were manifest. California had received an influx of poor, migrant workers from other states hoping to provide for their families as pickers, canners, and manual laborers. The author, Marion E. Russell, described a 1935 health insurance proposal to cover all state residents. Selected excerpts illustrate differences in philosophy still evident in current considerations of national health care reform, particularly as related to mandated coverage. Russell worked in the State Relief Administration in San Francisco.

Nurses' role in the prevention of infant mortality in 1884-1925: health disparities then and now.

Nursing has a strong historical precedence in the treatment of health disparities. This article evaluates the public health nurses' (PHNs') role with infant mortality during 1884-1920, specifically how nursing care impacted on conditions of poverty, poor nutrition, poor living conditions, lack of education, and lack of governmental policies that contributed to the poor health of infants a century ago. The historical significance of the early PHNs' role can improve our understanding of nursing practice with childhood health issues today. Suggestions are made for nursing to focus on health disparities in childhood obesity, in areas of environmental and policy changes, and the development of social programs and education for families to support healthier living.

The nurse as a social worker.

In the early twentieth century the role of the public health nurse (PHN) was expanding to meet the needs of individuals, families, and communities. Among the ideas discussed in the early nursing literature was that of the social nurse. This role was conceptualized as a combined nurse and social worker. Much of the PHNs work was with people of the poorer classes who needed assistance with both the medical aspects of their disease, as well as help with social needs such as food, rent money, and bedding. In this reprint from The Visiting Nurse Quarterly (1911), Ellen La Motte, Nurse-in-Chief with the Tuberculosis Division of the Baltimore Health Department, argued for this combined role based on economic efficiency. As she pointed out, it was "economic waste" to have two sets of workers going into homes when the nurse was capable, with additional education, of carrying out both roles. Additionally, from La Motte's perspective the only way the nurse could move beyond her role as the "physician's handmaiden" was through "social training" that prepared her for a broader scope of practice than that received in the hospital-based nursing schools. In the end, however, she left it open to nurses as "reasonable beings" to determine the direction the profession would take on this issue. La Motte's words provide historical context for issues contemporary public health nursing leaders are addressing, such as inter-professional boundaries between nurses and public health workers, reductions in the public health workforce, and economic constraints faced by the healthcare system. The Institute of Medicine mandate for inter-professional practice within the healthcare system, however, presents opportunities for exploring new roles and practice models for nurses in conjunction with our partners in public health.

The black bag.

In the early- to mid-twentieth century, stories about nursing practice submitted by nurses frequently appeared in Public Health Nursing. The article reprinted here is an example of this genre of publications. Originally published in April 1936, this article tells the story of a day in the work of one public health nurse as she moves about the city making home visits. In this article, Snow (1936) used personification of the iconic black bag to tell her story. Using this technique she brings to life the nuances of her day, the personalities of her patients, and the importance of the black bag to the work of public health nurses. What did nurses learn from stories such as this one? Themes embedded in this story reflect the role of the Public Health Nurse (PHN), as well as the environment in which she worked. For instance, in this story we learn that not only was the PHN a welcomed visitor in the homes of families struggling with health problems, but that she brought order out of chaos, as illustrated in "The New Arrival". "The Black Bag" also highlights the humor nurses experienced in their encounters with families, as well as the pathos in other situations. Stories served as a vehicle for nurses to share and learn about both the common elements of their work, as well as the unique features related to location and environment, such as rural and urban locales.

The end of an era. 1952.

This historical reprint from Public health nursing (Ramsay, ) summarizes the history of public health nursing services rendered by the Red Cross from its creation in 1912 until their termination in June 1951. The author was a public relations writer for the Red Cross. The paper is historically important for it provides chronology and perspective on the role of the Red Cross institutionalizing public health nursing and home nursing care in the United States during the first half of the 20(th) century. Of note are the three nursing services through which the Red Cross operated, each denoting a particular time and focus. Although Jane A. Delano is credited with the creation of the Red Cross nursing service, the initial organization was called Rural Nursing Service and was led by Fannie Clement. Within a short time, however, the Town and Country Nursing Service was created in recognition that not all of the public health nursing provided by the Red Cross was rendered in rural settings. The final transformation came when the service was again renamed, this time to highlight its more fundamental mission, as the Red Cross Public Health Nursing Service. The article is reprinted in its entirety.

Questions and answers: Some questions discussed at one of the round tables held at Chicago Institute with public health nurses.

There were a number of issues confronting public health nurses in 1919, including the differentiation of practice between visiting nurses and public health nurses, use of community partnerships when developing a new nursing service in a community, and standards of nursing work. Other issues included the focus of nursing work at the community/population versus individual level, how to balance the work load where there was only one nurse in a community, and educating the public about the value of public health nursing to the community. In this excerpt from the original publication, Ella Phillips Crandall responded to questions raised at a round table session held in Chicago in 1919 as a part of a Public Health Nursing Forum, and then published in the October 1919 issue of The Public Health Nurse. While the social context in which PHNs worked in 1919 were significantly different from those nurses face today, these insights are prescient to the issues faced by PHNs today as the profession continues to address issues related to standards of practice, role development, and educational preparation for both entry level and advanced practice.

Public health nursing: an autonomous career for World War II nurse veterans.

The 1944 G.I. Bill increased accessibility of higher education to male veterans. Less is known about how its availability affected opportunities for female veterans. The purpose of this study was to examine nurse veterans' use of the G. I. Bill at one large public university. Primary sources included archival documents of one large public university as well as articles published in professional nursing and medical journals of the 1940s and 1950s. Secondary sources addressing nursing and nursing education history, and the history of the G. I. Bill provided further context. Historical research methodology was conducted. Findings demonstrate that nurse veterans desired more independence in practice following the war. Archival documents of one large public university show that nurse veterans used G. I. Bill funds to seek degrees in public health nursing. The specialty of public health provided increased independence and autonomy of practice not experienced in hospital based care. G.I. Bill educational funds provided these nurse veterans the means to attain degrees in public health nursing, providing them the opportunity for more autonomous practice.

Four responsibilities of the tuberculosis nurse, circa 1919.

Specialization in public health nursing practice was beginning to occur early in the 20th century. In a 1919 paper published in The Public Health Nurse, Mary Van Zile argued that there were four essential functions of the tuberculosis nurse. Later that year, Janet Scott reported on the results of a partnership between the tuberculosis dispensary, the Lions Club, and other Oklahoma City community organizations, which illustrated the application of Van Zile's principles, and the expanding scope of public health nursing practice.

Public health nursing-indispensible and economical for everyone if organized.

In August 1930, the editors of the original Public Health Nursing published an article derived from a speech made by Dr. Haven Emerson, then professor of public health administration at Columbia University, on the topic of the distribution and use of public health nurses. The speech was made before an audience of lay board members from hospitals and public health nursing organizations in Chicago, February 17, 1930. Emerson reported the results of a data analysis in which the numbers and credentials of public health nurses in 24 cities across the United States were reported. Excerpts from this report and Dr. Emerson's conclusions are powerful reminders that while there were issues of labor supply and distribution, the power of nurses to effect social transformation was central to the role as conceived by those administering public health services.

Go down to suffering and raise it up.

In a partial reprint of a January 1919 editorial from The Public Health Nurse, readers will find an Editor's attempt to find meaning in the long, bitter, and highly destructive Great War, known in contemporarily as World War I. The Editor expresses hope that something constructive can emerge from so much devastation. Parallels to contemporary conflicts are readily apparent. Veterans, specifically nurses returning from the battlefields of Europe in this excerpt, deserve acknowledgement and through the knowledge of suffering gained in war, use the skills they possess to advance health and human happiness in times of peace.