Biography of Florence Nightingale, the pioneer of nursing in the world

Biography of Florence Nightingale, the pioneer of nursing in the world 

Florence Nightingale revolutionized the job of nursing. She cared for sick and wounded British soldiers during the Crimean War (1853-1856), and she saved many lives. Her success in improving nursing care brought her great fame.

                                                                                               

A passion for nursing

Florence Nightingale was born in 1820 to a wealthy English family. She decided in her teens to become a nurse, even though her parents disapproved. At that time, most nurses were from poor families and had little or no training.

But Nightingale was determined to have her way. In 1850 and 1851, she received training at hospitals in Egy
pt and Germany.

In 1853, Nightingale took charge of a hospital in London, England. Here she showed skills as a nurse and an organizer. She had bells put beside patients’ beds. When patients needed a nurse, they rang their bell. Nobody had thought of this idea before.

The crimean war

After the Crimean War broke out in 1854, Nightingale was stirred by newspaper reports about the primitive sanitation methods and grossly inadequate nursing facilities at the large British barracks-hospital at Üsküdar (now part of İstanbul, Turkey). She dispatched a letter to the British minister of war, volunteering her services in Crimea. At the same time, unaware of her action, the minister of war proposed that she assume direction of all nursing operations at the war front.

Nightingale set out for Üsküdar accompanied by 38 Roman Catholic and Anglican sisters and lay nurses. They found that the military hospitals lacked supplies, the wounded soldiers were unwashed and filthy, and diseases such as typhus, cholera, and dysentery were rampant. Under Nightingale’s supervision, efficient nursing departments were established at Üsküdar and later at Balaklava in Crimea. Through her tireless efforts the death rate among the sick and the wounded was greatly reduced. Nightingale became a national hero and was called the Lady with the Lamp and the Angel of the Crimea. Although Nightingale contracted a severe illness in the Crimea in 1855, she stayed with her hospital until the end of the war in 1856.

After the war

Returning to England when the war was over, Nightingale immediately began to reorganize the army medical service. She helped hospitals acquire proper ventilation and drainage systems and select competent, properly trained orderlies. She also introduced meticulous hospital record keeping and had an army medical school established. With a public fund raised in tribute to her services in the Crimea, Nightingale founded the Nightingale School and Home for Nurses at Saint Thomas’s Hospital in London. The opening of this school marked the beginning of professional education in nursing.

Florence Nightingale’s contributions to the evolution of nursing as a profession were invaluable. Before she undertook her reforms, nurses were largely untrained personnel who considered their job a menial chore; through her efforts the stature of nursing was raised to a medical profession with high standards of education and important responsibilities. The graduates of her school soon started nursing schools in other hospitals, and the movement for training nurses spread rapidly. Her advice was continually sought, not only on nursing matters, but also on hospital construction and management and on every aspect of public health.

Nightingale received many honors from foreign governments and in 1907 became the first woman to receive the British Order of Merit. She died in London on August 13, 1910. In 1915 the Crimean Monument in Waterloo Place, London, was erected in her honor. Her writings include Notes on Nursing (1860), the first textbook for nurses, which was translated into many languages. Among her other writings are Notes on Hospitals (1859) and Notes on Nursing for the Labouring Classes (1861).