"Moms and babies first"-A historical overview of the Association of Women's Health Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses.

Professional nursing bodies have had a well-established, collective history of advancing the nursing profession through career development, advocacy, and continuing education. The purpose of this review paper is to provide a historical overview of these entities, leading up to the formation of specialty nursing associations and the emergence of the Association of Women's Health Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses (AWHONN). The Association of Women's Health Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses is a leader in research, education, and advocacy in the field of women's health, obstetric, and neonatal nursing that has focused on promoting the health and well-being of women, newborns, and their families for the past fifty years.

District nursing renascent as Wales adopts safe staffing levels.

This article reflects on the history of the NHS in Wales and how this has led to its current structure. How this structure supports integrated working across primary, community and secondary care and how further integration with social care is moving forward and its direct effects on district nursing are explored. This article describes how district nursing is meeting these challenges. Support for district nurses as part of integrated multiprofessional teams is being developed to promote appropriately staffed teams centred on meeting the requirements of people within a designated area and ensuring that home is the best and first place of care.

Reflections on nurse education: past, present and future.

Janet Scammell, Associate Professor (Nursing), Bournemouth University, reflects on the changes in nursing that she has seen since beginning her nursing career 40 years ago.

Brazilian nursing history on the shoulders of giants.

BACKGROUND: This study describes the route followed by nursing in Brazil, through the foundation of nursing organizations and the emergence of nursing leaders and pioneers. AIM: To present the origins of modern nursing in Brazil, identifying the main nurse-leaders and analysing their performance for the creation and consolidation of the nursing organizations. METHODS: It is a historical and social study with descriptive approach, to describe the process of Brazilian nursing professionalization and leadership through a literature review. RESULTS: The oldest nursing organization is the Brazilian Nursing Association that holds scientific and cultural activities. There are also nurses' unions and nursing specialty associations, such as the Brazilian Academy for the History of Nursing, and the Federal Nursing Council. The latter has compulsory membership for controlling nursing services according to the qualifications of the personnel. The very first school for nurses in the Nightingale system was created in São Paulo, 1894, at the Samaritan Hospital, and by the government in 1923, in Rio de Janeiro, for which American nurses, led by Ethel Parsons, sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation, were essential for the creation of the Anna Nery Nursing School, still in operation within a federal university. Some nurses pioneered these works such as Edith Fraenkel, Maria Rosa Pinheiro, Amalia Carvalho and others. CONCLUSION: The work done by nursing leaders has brought to the profession a better status and made it more recognized by the society.

Fire in the belly and the professionalization of nurses: a historical analysis of Crohn disease care.

Today, professional nurses around the world are stepping up to meet the needs of individuals with Crohn disease, using their specialized knowledge and skills that demonstrate areas of expertise that have not always existed. The gastrointestinal-specific knowledge being used by these 21st-century nurses exists today because progressive efforts of nurses in previous decades moved the profession of nursing forward. The purpose of this article was to describe and analyze the development of the role of nurses in responding to new challenges patients with Crohn disease face since the emergence of the disease in the early 20th century. The authors used traditional historic research methods to conduct the study. Primary sources include nursing journals and textbooks published in the 20th and 21st centuries and documents archived at The Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, where Burrill B. Crohn conducted his seminal work. The significance of the findings is that the changing role of nurses in caring for patients with Crohn disease mirrors the professionalization of nursing during the 20th and early 21st centuries.

Cultures of control: A historical analysis of the development of infection control nursing in Ireland.

Responses to the rise of antimicrobial resistance in Europe and North America included establishment of special hospital infection control teams of a microbiologist and a nurse. Based on the testimonies of seven infection control nurses in Irish hospitals appointed during 1979-1990, this article examines the early development and expressions of their disciplinary practice. Fairman's model of collaborative practice was used to examine the context in which the role emerged, the places practice was negotiated and mutually constructed, and exemplars of collaborative practice. Aspects of the relationship between theory and method in Wengraf's biographical narrative interpretive method (BNIM) used to generate the nurses' accounts of their early experiences in the role are highlighted. Practice was contingent on effective negotiation of places of practice, and disciplinary practice bore hallmarks of collaborative practice. The infection control nurse transitioned from conspicuous outsider and object of suspicion to valued resource for patients and staff. Infection control nursing came to be a prototype for new specialist nursing roles in hospitals.

Breaking barriers.

Johanne Tomlinson detected connections between high anxiety levels, confrontational behaviour and self-harm in offenders in her care at a men's prison. Her observations led to the launch of an anxiety management service, which she now runs alongside her regular nursing work. Her commitment has resulted in her being named Nursing Standard's nurse of the year 2012.

The historical role of the otorhinolarynoglogy nurse practitioner.

The role of the Nurse Practitioner (NP) in the specialty practice of Otorhinolaryngology (ORL) continues to evolve. NPs work in a collaborative practice environment integrating nursing and the medical model. They engage in critical thinking skills, expert clinical practice, and professional leadership, and evaluate and conduct research. This article presents a literature review on the historical evolution of this specialty practice role. Examination of past and present roles in varied practice settings and diverse healthcare systems provide a historical perspective and the momentum necessary to chart future growth and development.

Margretta Madden Styles.

In recognition of the Year of the Nurse and the Midwife initiative, AJN will periodically highlight the works of key nursing leaders. Sometimes it will be in the form of articles from our archives, at other times it will be excerpts from or summaries of nurses' work with related commentary. Here, courtesy of Margretta Madden Styles's daughter, we've reprinted Styles's "Declaration of Belief About the Nature and Purpose of Nursing," originally published in her book, On Nursing: Toward a New Endowment (C.V. Mosby Company, 1982). We hope it will inspire you.

Betty Lank: a kind and gentle anesthetist devoted to children.

Many noted clinicians and educators led the development of nurse anesthesia as a profession during the first half of the 20th century. Betty E. Lank, CRNA, a nurse anesthetist at Children's Hospital Boston, Massachusetts, for 34 years, devoted her professional life to the delivery and advancement of pediatric anesthesia. She is credited with many contributions including the first use of cyclopropane for infant anesthesia, developing pediatric-sized anesthesia masks and ventilation bags, and instituting standards for specialized postanesthesia recovery areas. Lank recorded her anesthesia experiences in various nursing publications and shared her knowledge with colleagues at professional meetings. Her accomplishments make her a notable figure in the early history of pediatric anesthesia, and her dedication helped forge the foundation for anesthesia at Children's Hospital Boston.

Nephrology nursing 1915-1970: a historical study of the integration of technology and care.

Findings of this study of the role and functions of nurses working with renal dialysis and transplant teams between 1915 and 1970 suggest that many of the activities of dialysis and transplant nurses were assistive and technical in nature. However, further analysis of the characteristics of direct nursing care demonstrates that early nephrology nurses incorporated family support, interpersonal communication, and patient teaching as essential components in order to assist patients and their families in coping with the stresses of receiving these new experimental treatments.

The development of kidney transplant nursing.

An analysis of published literature, interviews with early transplant nurses, and other primary source materials shows how evolving medical treatments for rejection, nurses' ability to learn on the job, and their commitment to patients influenced the development of kidney transplantation as a specialized area of practice. The work of these nurses work is discussed in the context of unfolding nursing specialization at the middle of the twentieth century.

A brief history in nephrology pharmacotherapy.

Advances in drug therapy for patients with kidney disease have contributed to increased exercise capacity, reduced cardiovascular disease, decreased renal bone disease, improved quality of life, and most importantly, reduced morbidity and mortality. New insights into the pathophysiology of chronic kidney disease (CKD) have helped lead to the development of many novel drugs and treatments. The purpose of this article is to highlight some of the developments in nephrology pharmacotherapy that occurred during the first 40 years of the American Nephrology Nurses' Association.