Nursing in the Twenty-First Century - Essay Example

The Outlook of Nurses and Nursing in the Twenty-First Century Among other pillars that define the nursing profession is the principle of ethics, which in breadth explains a code of acceptable behaviour within the health care discipline. Nurses today face challenges in framing their own ethical positions and in dealing with patients and the members of the health care team. They must therefore be prepared to deliver patient care in an ethical manner because just as is the case with all other professions, ethics are paramount for effectiveness in service delivery. Nurses have direct interaction with patients the most as compared to other medical professionals. Images of Nurses and Nursing  One of the images that have dominated nursing in the modern day is the increased amount of responsibilities and training that nurses have to undertake in order to improve on the quality of health care that is given to patients. The role of nurses has changed from the past years when they were portrayed in films to be either sexy or uncaring (Burton, 2011). That is as depicted in such films like ‘One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’, ‘Nurse Ratchet’, or from the television show ‘Mash’. The modern day nursing education takes student’s through a rigorous nurse-training program that equip them with the necessary skills to run a nursing unit in a hospital or doctor’s office. Nurses today are able to take care of patients with minimal supervision from doctors unlike as it was in the past. In the past, nurses were viewed as ‘non-important’ in making health decisions, as ‘doctor’s mistresses’ and as such were not respected by patients. On the contrary, the responsibilities bestowed to all nurses in patient care today and the decisions that they have to make on a daily basis make it one of the factors that define how nursing career has become a competitive career in the 21st century. In addition, the establishment of nursing schools in the late 19th century is a major factor that has influenced contemporary nursing. The way that nursing schools were run at the beginning has remained in most of the nursing schools worldwide with very little modifications. An apprenticeship model was involved in training the nurses, which would take about two months; they started with making beds before progressing to other more complicated tasks. The length of the program was initially one year, however, it was later increased to two and three years depending with the country and this duration of training has remained up to date with the longest duration of training graduate nurses being four years in some countries. Without the establishment of the nursing training schools, the field of nursing would not be as what we know it today. Another very popular historical event that shaped nursing is World War I with a nurse named Florence nightingale who took care of the wounded soldiers in the war receiving much attention. Florence nightingale is adored all over the world for the role she played during the war period. Her selfless efforts defined the course of the nursing profession making it one that is fully dedicated to caring for the sick as well as the elderly and able to manage some medical therapies on patients, which do not need the expertise of doctors. The contribution of Florence nightingale to the profession of nursing has largely shaped what we know as modern day nursing practices. Furthermore, the establishment of the association of American nurses (ANA) was another historical event since it provided a platform for nurses to regulate their practice and provided them with a bargaining platform with the government. The American nurses association was not initially interested in registering nurses, but after sometime it was mandatory that all nurses in America must be registered with the organization in order for them to be allowed to practice. The association was later renamed to American nurses association and targets to represent nurses and champion issues regarding nursing worldwide; the contribution of the organization to the global nursing scene is felt worldwide. Some of the major issues in nursing career include ethical issues, which have been on the rise in the recent past. In addition to possessing the communication skills, nurses also need to be very knowledgeable on ethical issues in nursing in order for them to be able to influence the decisions made by ethics committee in health care or by politicians (Gallagher, 2012). Having ethical knowledge enables advanced care nurses to contribute positively to discussions on ethical issues that will put the nurses in influential positions (Jolade, 2013). Several ways through which a nurse can be involved in decision-making are known, however, the physical presence such as being elected in public offices would be more effective in influencing policy as compared to other methods such as letter writing, which can be considered positive and may be ignored by the policy makers. Over years, there have been emerging issues that have led to changes in direction of nursing as a career with ‘unanticipated diseases’ being such an example. This has made it a challenge for nurses to be able to ease the effect of the diseases since little about them is known especially on their causative factors. Secondly, the lifestyles of most Americans are not healthy as has been fuelled by the media, which has glorified unhealthy lifestyles such as alcoholism and smoking among the young generation. This makes it very hard for nurses to change the mindsets of these adolescents for healthy living. Such issues that are coming up in the field of nursing have the capacity to change the profession to include support services that will be helpful in ensuring holistic approach to patient conditions. Today, the field of epidemiology has advanced from studies carried out manually about various diseases to everything being done with the help of technology. This implies that nursing practices are likely to be done technologically in the future where one nurse will be able to take care of a multitude of patients simultaneously. In addition, the health policies in the next 20 years is likely to change positively because legislative measure that currently control the use of harmful substances such as drugs and alcohol are likely to improve. This therefore shows that the current image of nurses and nursing are likely to change depending on the trends to be adopted in the medical field. References Burton, R., & Ormrod, G. (2011). Nursing: Transition to professional practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gallagher, A. (2012). Editorial. Nursing Ethics, 19(1), 3-4. Jolade, E.A. (2013). Assessing ethical competency of new registered nurses. New Jersey, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University. Read More