200 years since the birth of Florence Nightingale, the founder of professional nursing

200 years since the birth of Florence Nightingale, the founder of professional nursing

International Nurses' Day is celebrated annually and worldwide on May 12, as it marks the anniversary of Florence Nightingale's birth. Florence Nightingale was a pioneer in nursing; her far-sighted ideas and reforms played a significant role in the professionalization of health care. Some of these ideas remain the basis for current nursing today. The greatest success for which we can be grateful to this lady was the transformation of nursing into a respected profession. In 1860, she founded the first vocational school for nurses - The Nightingale Home and Training School for Nurses, St. Thomas’s Hospital.

In addition, she contributed to improving the standard of health care, publishing more than 200 books, reports and leaflets on the organization of hospitals, which are still read by the general public and highly respected today. Her most important work is called "Notes on Nursing: What It Is and What It Is Not".

On this day, we also commemorate the difficult workload of nurses, especially during the pandemic. Due to the current situation, both healthcare professionals and the general public are aware of the complexity of the nursing profession, and the profession’s prestige is rising again — exactly as Florence Nightingale would like it to. After all, in her time she was an icon of nursing; brave, determined and not afraid to fight for what was right. Her honourable character manifested itself in the war period, when she herself stood at the front line. She nursed the wounded and in her free time thought about how to improve nursing care. Surely Florence would be proud to see that we are following in her footsteps, and in other difficult times - the fight against coronavirus – nurses can pull together and are not afraid to live up to their mission.

We wish all nurses, midwives, and students of these fields a lot of strength, determination and fulfilment from the professional care that you provide so well.

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