The American Association for the History of Nursing (AAHN) is a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting the history of nursing in various ways, using history to achieve adequate recognition for professional nurses and the pioneers of nursing, and shaping values and beliefs in nursing in the context of history. [1] [2] The association sponsors an annual autumn conference on nursing history and publishes the annual Nursing History Review. [1] The American Association for the History of Nursing provides important historical resources for helping nurses understand the importance of their profession. [3]
The AAHN has several goals, including promoting interest in, and collaboration on, the history of nursing; educating nurses and the general public about the historical heritage of the nursing profession; encouraging research in the history of nursing; preserving and making accessible historical materials relevant to nursing; and promoting nursing curricula with adequate coverage of the history of nursing. [1] There are about 25 people serving in the AAHN as executives or members of the board of directors. The president of the AAHN serves a two-year term. [4]
A group of nurse historians founded, in the early 1980s, the International History of Nursing Society with the purpose of promoting the history of nursing and collaborating on research in the history of nursing. The society was based in Illinois and the society's members soon decided that an international emphasis was premature, so the society's name was changed to the American Association for the History of Nursing (AAHN). The AAHN's annual conferences were begun in 1984. [5] The society's first president (from 1979 to 1980) was Teresa E. Christy (1927–1982). [4] [6]
History might be an essential component of medical knowledge, and this include the history of nursing as promoted by the AAHN. [7] According to Susan Mokotoff Reverby, the history of nursing emerged in the 1970s as an active area of scholarship, and the AAHN played an important role in this emergence. [8]
The AAHN annually presents, at its autumn conference, four awards for completed research in the history of nursing:
Eligibility for the awards is restricted to AHN members. Submissions for awards should specify which award the AAHN member is applying for. [9]
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) is a registered trade union in the United Kingdom for those in the profession of nursing. It was founded in 1916, receiving its royal charter in 1928. Queen Elizabeth II was the patron until her death in 2022. The majority of members are registered nurses; however student nurses and healthcare assistants are also members. There is also a category of membership, at a reduced cost, for retired people.
The American Nurses Association (ANA) is a 501(c)(6) professional organization to advance and protect the profession of nursing. It started in 1896 as the Nurses Associated Alumnae and was renamed the American Nurses Association in 1911. It is based in Silver Spring, Maryland and Ernest Grant, PhD, RN, FAAN is the current president.
The Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing (ΣΘΤ) is the second-largest nursing organization in the world with approximately 135,000 active members. While often referred to by nurses as simply Sigma, its official name is "Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing".
The Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) is a professional degree in nursing. In the United States, the DNP is one of three doctorate degrees in nursing, the others being the research degrees PhD and the Doctor of Nursing Science. Internationally, since the 1990s, there have been a wide number of doctorate degrees available for nurses, including DProf, PhD and others. Internationally all such doctoral nursing degrees include mandatory research elements and take longer than a single year to complete.
The Endocrine Society is a professional, international medical organization in the field of endocrinology and metabolism, founded in 1916 as The Association for the Study of Internal Secretions. The official name of the organization was changed to the Endocrine Society on January 1, 1952. It is a leading organization in the field and publishes four leading journals. It has more than 18,000 members from over 120 countries in medicine, molecular and cellular biology, biochemistry, physiology, genetics, immunology, education, industry, and allied health. The Society's mission is: "to advance excellence in endocrinology and promote its essential and integrative role in scientific discovery, medical practice, and human health."
Mary Eliza Mahoney was the first African-American to study and work as a professionally trained nurse in the United States. In 1879, Mahoney was the first African American to graduate from an American school of nursing.
Health advocacy or health activism encompasses direct service to the individual or family as well as activities that promote health and access to health care in communities and the larger public. Advocates support and promote the rights of the patient in the health care arena, help build capacity to improve community health and enhance health policy initiatives focused on available, safe and quality care. Health advocates are best suited to address the challenge of patient-centered care in our complex healthcare system. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) defines patient-centered care as: Health care that establishes a partnership among practitioners, patients, and their families to ensure that decisions respect patients’ wants, needs, and preferences and that patients have the education and support they need to make decisions and participate in their own care. Patient-centered care is also one of the overreaching goals of health advocacy, in addition to safer medical systems, and greater patient involvement in healthcare delivery and design.
Lavinia Lloyd Dock was a nurse, feminist, author, pioneer in nursing education and social activist. Dock was an assistant superintendent at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing under Isabel Hampton Robb. She founded what would become the National League for Nursing with Robb and Mary Adelaide Nutting. Dock was a contributing editor to the American Journal of Nursing and authored several books, including a four-volume history of nursing and Materia Medica for Nurses, the nurse's standard manual of drugs for many years. In her later life, she also campaigned for social reform, particularly women's rights.
Nursing is a profession within the health care sector focused on the care of individuals, families, and communities so they may attain, maintain, or recover optimal health and quality of life. Nurses may be differentiated from other health care providers by their approach to patient care, training, and scope of practice. Nurses practice in many specialties with differing levels of prescription authority. Nurses comprise the largest component of most healthcare environments; but there is evidence of international shortages of qualified nurses. Nurses collaborate with other healthcare providers such as physicians, nurse practitioners, physical therapists, and psychologists. Unlike nurse practitioners, nurses typically cannot prescribe medications in the US. Nurse practitioners are nurses with a graduate degree in advanced practice nursing. They practice independently in a variety of settings in more than half of the United States. Since the postwar period, nurse education has undergone a process of diversification towards advanced and specialized credentials, and many of the traditional regulations and provider roles are changing.
Susan Mokotoff Reverby is a Wellesley College professor. She has written on the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, and she uncovered the syphilis experiments in Guatemala.
The Oncology Nursing Society (ONS) is a nonprofit membership organization of more than 35,000 members committed to promoting excellence in oncology nursing and the transformation of cancer care.
Chi Eta Phi Sorority, Inc. (ΧΗΦ) is an international, nonprofit, professional service organization for registered professional nurses and student nurses, representing many cultures and diverse ethnic backgrounds. The Sorority has more than 8000 members located throughout the United States, the District of Columbia, Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, and Monrovia, Liberia. Dr. Sarah Killian, DNP, RN is the current National President.
Teresa Thomas "Terry" Fulmer, is the current President of The John A. Hartford Foundation. Prior positions include distinguished professor and dean of the Bouvé College of Health Sciences at Northeastern University, and Dean of the College of Nursing at New York University. She is known for her extensive research in geriatrics and elder abuse. She has received funding from the National Institute on Aging, the National Institute of Nursing Research, and multiple foundations for her research regarding elder abuse.
Lucile Petry Leone was an American nurse who was the founding director of the Cadet Nurse Corps in 1943. Because the Nurse Corps met its recruiting quotas, it was not necessary for the US to draft nurses in World War II. She was the first woman and the first nurse to be appointed as Assistant Surgeon General of the United States Public Health Service.
Eunice Verdell Rivers Laurie was an African American nurse who worked in the state of Alabama. She is mostly known for her work as one of the nurses of the U.S. Public Health Service Syphilis Study in Macon County from 1932 to 1972. The Tuskegee Experiment, as laymen call it, was an inhumane study that deliberately allowed black men to develop syphilis when there was treatment for the disease.
The history of nursing in the United States focuses on the professionalization of nursing since the Civil War.
Roger Watson is a British academic. He is Academic Dean in the School of Nursing, Southwest Medical University, China and until 2022 was the Professor of Nursing at the University of Hull. He is the editor-in-chief of Nurse Education in Practice and an Editorial Board Member of the WikiJournal of Medicine. Watson was the Founding Chair of the Lancet Commission on Nursing, and a founding member of the Global Advisory Group for the Future of Nursing. Watson was elected Vice President of the National Conference of University Professors in 2020 and became President in 2022 until 2024.
Christine I. Mitchell is an American filmmaker and bioethicist and until her retirement in September 2022, the executive director of the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School (HMS).
Margaret Scott-Wright was a Professor of Nursing at the University of Edinburgh, and later head of nursing schools in Canada. Her research related to public health and nursing education. In 1971, she became the first professor in Nursing Studies in the United Kingdom.
Marita Gerianne Titler is an American nurse scholar. She is the Rhetaugh G. Dumas Endowed Chair in the University of Michigan's School of Nursing.