Monday, May 11, 2009

International Nurses' Day

Tomorrow, May 12, is International Nurses' Day (and Florence Nightingale's birthday). In honor of these two events, we at SBI Publishing (a division of Stinson Brand Innovation) are releasing our e-book Notes on Nursing by Florence Nightingale.

This e-book is one of the first in our new series entitled Innovation Classics dedicated to collecting and publishing the best - or perhaps the underappreciated - innovation writing of the past. Our first set of Innovation Classics e-books includes well-known stories that we are republishing for the purpose of providing them at no charge.


Nursing seems to be constantly reinventing itself, as it responds to new professional and technical developments. This, of course, creates the issues of branding the nurse’s contemporary identity in the context of the past. Some within the profession say this sense of disconnection with history affects nursing’s greater status and legitimacy within medical practices and hospitals.

Even Nightingale herself said, "I use the word nursing for want of a better term. It has been limited to signify little more than the administration of medicines and the application of poultices. It ought to signify the proper use of fresh air, light, warmth, cleanliness, quiet, and the proper selection and administration of diet--all at the least expense of vital power to the patient." Today, innovations in health, science, and technology are having a major impact
on the nursing discipline.

This book is the Nightingale legacy – research and practice. In Nightingale's view, nursing is a search for truth, the ability to collect accurate information and make correct observations. She wrote, "If you cannot get the habit of observation one way or other, you had better give up being a nurse, for it is not your calling, however kind and anxious you might be." While promoting and implementing research-based practice is not a simple task (nor is it solely reliant upon nurses), we will all benefit from the innovation forces advancing medical treatments.

My hope, as the editor of this series, is that you will not just read Innovation Classics, but also apply their lessons to your challenges of creativity and innovation. Most of all, I hope that this and other volumes of Innovation Classics help you observe the changes from the past, and also imagine the applications for the future.

Click here to download your Notes on Nursing e-book at no charge.

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