The Lasting Influence of the Progressive Visiting Nurses of the Late 19th Century

Nursing has a long history of advocacy and activism on behalf of vulnerable populations. For Women’s History Month, we have been drawing attention to the theme of the intimate connection between nursing history and women’s history. In this post, we share an image of nurses at the Henry Street Settlement in New York’s Lower East Side in the late 19th century, where nurse and social worker Lillian Wald organized nurses to bring essential health services and much more to the poor immigrant populations of the area.

A new model of possibility.

These early visiting nurses established a new model of possibility that has echoed through efforts since to improve the health and living conditions of millions. The following text, from the editorial comment in the January 1902 issue of the American Journal of Nursing, suggests that the efforts of these progressive nurses in the Lower East Side threw into relief some of the forces of corruption in New York City’s famed and powerful political machine that were keeping the poor in such abysmal and unhealthy living and working conditions.

Henry Street Settlement Nurse, Lower East Side, New York City

“After the downfall of Tammany, […]

2019-03-15T11:07:58-04:00March 15th, 2019|Nursing|0 Comments
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Is the Current Nurse Manager Role Attractive to Millennials and Gen Xers?

Image by TeroVesalainen from Pixabay

A perennially challenging role.

I’ve always found the role of nurse manager to be the most difficult one in health care. Crushed between staff nurses begging for enough resources to do the job and administrators pressing for cost containment, nurse managers often find it hard to make any progress at all.

This job comes with 24-hour responsibility, often (incredibly) for more than one unit. This can mean taking responsibility for, say, 50 patients, and 80 or more staff. Just managing payroll for so many people (as many managers still have to do) can take half the pay period! And all this for the princely salary of . . . less than what many of their senior staff nurses are making.

Redesigning the nurse manager role includes greater role flexibility.

Those of us who’ve been in nursing for decades simply accepted that, if you wanted to move up the nursing career ladder, you would have to accept all of the above. Younger generations of nurses, though, see things differently. […]

2019-03-15T10:09:41-04:00March 13th, 2019|Nursing, nursing career|0 Comments
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Women’s History is Nursing’s History

We would be remiss not to highlight Women’s History Month—after all, nursing’s history is intrinsically tied to women’s history. As women became more independent, so too did nursing. And it’s important to acknowledge our history of contributions to shaping this country’s health care system. As I note in a March 2015 editorial:

“The story of nursing continues to be one of social commitment, innovation, and problem solving. It legitimizes and supports our inclusion on governing boards and our presence at policymaking tables. It can infuse each of us with pride and energy for the work we do.”

One hundred and nineteen years of archives.

Linda Richards, first American trained nurse

AJN has 119 years of archives documenting nursing’s legacy (all free to read for subscribers). To mark Women’s History Month, each Friday this month we are highlighting an archive article and making it free until April 1. Today we’re sharing “Recollections of a Pioneer Nurse,” which was published in January 1903 (click through to the PDF version for the best version).

First trained nurse in the United States.

The article was written by Linda Richards (1841-1940), considered the first trained nurse in the United States. It’s a vivid first-person account of her experiences in nursing at the turn of the century, and […]

2019-03-15T10:04:27-04:00March 8th, 2019|Nursing|0 Comments
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In Nursing, What Does It Really Mean to Trust Your Gut?

The March Reflections essay in AJN touches on several big questions:

  • How can you tell if a patient presents an immediate suicide risk?
  • What do nurses really mean when they speak of ‘trusting your gut’?
  • And what are the limits of advocating for a patient when a nurse finds herself in potential opposition to a physician?

by Annelisa Ochoa for AJN

In “Mr. Blue and His Six Cats” (free until April 1), nurse Mariya Rader vividly and economically describes a series of tense events that occurred one shift in the ER where she worked early in her career.

The clock is ticking: should the patient brought in by EMS be discharged because he denies suicidal intent? We follow her persistent search for the right course of action through a series of encounters with the caring team of paramedics who brought him to the ER and are familiar with his ways, the inexperienced new resident physician, and the patient himself.

Trust your gut?

The author had always heard nurses say to ‘trust your gut.’ But what did it really mean?

Remember, I was still relatively new to nursing; I hadn’t yet learned to depend on myself. But I had this sick feeling deep down that I couldn’t […]

2019-03-06T09:59:32-05:00March 6th, 2019|Nursing, nursing stories|2 Comments
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When Family Caregivers Are Unsure

Those who care for ailing family members are often faced with new symptoms or with changes in a loved one’s condition. They have to decide if it’s a natural progression of the disease and “just” another thing to manage, or if it signals a serious problem like a urinary tract infection, pneumonia, or a COPD exacerbation that needs to be addressed. Often, they end up in the ER, in some cases needlessly.

The authors of the original research CE article in this month’s issue, “New Acute Symptoms in Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment: What Should Family Caregivers Do?,” write:

“If caregivers have a clear understanding and awareness of their loved ones’ existing symptoms, they’ll be better prepared to recognize changes and new symptoms. Early recognition makes it more likely that the patient can be treated in place and trips to the ED can be avoided.”

Are caregivers being adequately prepared?

As I write in the March editorial, with over 43.5 million adults providing care to family members, we need to ensure they are prepared to do so by the time their loved one is discharged from the hospital

These caregivers provide complex care—from injections and ostomy care to managing ventilators and tube feedings—and according to surveys conducted by AARP, they […]

2019-03-04T07:29:14-05:00March 4th, 2019|family caregiving, family caregiving, Patients|0 Comments
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Views expressed on the blog are solely those of the authors or persons quoted. They do not necessarily reflect AJN’s views or those of Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
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