Nursing: The Profession Of Nurses

Nurses have been caring for the sick for centuries. The nurses of the past, which were little more than doctor 's helpers, bear little resemblance to the educated, respected nurses of today. The nursing profession has shown enormous changes over the last 100 years and is expected to continue to improve in the future. In the past, nurses were inexperienced young women who were taught and trained on the job. The duties that nurses performed in the past are quite different to the duties of the present day. Because originally nurses were not formally educated, they were rarely respected and were treated harshly. They mostly cared for the sick by feeding and cleaning at the patient 's bedside, leaving the doctors to do the actual decision making.

The original nurses were nuns or young women treating men during times of war. One of the first nurses to be recorded was Florence Nightingale. Florence Nightingale, viewed as the founder of modern nursing, was a nurse courageously treating soldiers near the battlefield during the Crimean War in 1854. Florence Nightingale worked in military hospitals and helped develop the mindset that nursing is an appropriate and respectable profession for young women. Florence Nightingale started The Nightingale Training School for nursing on June 24, 1860 and developed a curriculum for schooling the future nurses. Nightingale 's main focus was the importance of good hygiene and sanitary conditions while treating patients. Her ideas about hygiene, bacteria and diseases spreading from one person to the next, revolutionized patient care (Lee 245). Taking the lead from Nightingale, New Zealand was the first country to regulate nurses nationally, adopting the Nurses Registration Act on September 12, 1901 (Adams). What once was a women 's only job is now drawing both men and women. In 2011, 9.6% of nurses are men

The income the nurses receive in the present day contributes to nursing as being very desirable. An AORN 2014 survey claims, "The average staff nurse, for example, earns $67,800 ($400 more than in 2013), and the average director/ VP/assistant director of nursing earns $110,700($1,200 more than in 2013)" (Bacon). Nurses also receive excellent work benefits such as complete medical and hospital coverage, paid vacations, paid holidays, life and dental insurance and many more (Sacks). Another benefit of nursing as a career is the flexible work hours and the option to work full or part. Working part time allows nurses to spend more time with their with