Florence Nightingale brought women to army medical hospitals and improved medical conditions throughout Britain in addition to opening nurse's training and developing the
Florence Nightingale- Mother of Modern Nursing
Florence Nightingale is recognized throughout the world as the founder of modern nursing. She was the second daughter born to wealthy parents, William Edward and Frances Nightingale. She was born on May 12, 1820 and named after her birthplace, Florence, Italy. Her older sister was named Parthenope, for the Greek name of her birth place, Naples. Both daughters were born on their parents' two year long honeymoon.
Florence and Parthenope were schooled at home by their father who had attended Cambridge University. While Parthenope excelled at needlework and the arts, Florence was studious. The girls were enthusiastic and sociable and were expected to marry into high society. But while wandering in a garden one day, Florence heard a call from God, telling her to do his work. That work turned out to be nursing.
Florence took an interest in hospitals and nursing, and made visits to the homes of the sick in the village. It was not considered proper for a well educated young woman to become a nurse in the mid-1800s, however, and her parents forbade it. But during a vacation with family friends, Charles and Selina Bracebridge, Nightingale traveled through Germany in July 1850. While at Kaiserwerth near Dusseldorf, they visited Pastor Theodor Fliedner's hospital and school for deaconesses. Nightingale returned a year later and took three months of nurse's training.
Nightingale was now qualified to accept a position as Superintendent of the Establishment for Gentlewomen during Illness at No. 1 Harley Street, London and she began the job in 1853.
A year later, France, Germany and Britain declared war on Russia, a conflict called the Crimean War. Sidney Hubert, Britain's Minister of War, knew Florence Nightingale and assigned her to oversee the introduction of female nurses into hospitals for the wounded in Turkey. "Lady-In-Chief" Nightingale and a contingent of 38 nurses arrived in the Constantinople suburb of Scutari on November 4, 1854.
They were not welcomed at first by the male doctors and medics, and were essentially ignored. But when a fresh shipment of wounded arrived all nurses were kept very busy. The nurses performed nursing duties, but also tended to the men's spirits and other practical matters by writing letters and sending pay home to their families.
The nurses were a huge success. After returning from the Crimean War a public fund was set up to support Nightingale's reforms of Britain's hospitals. She used it to set up the Nightingale Training School for nurses at St. Thomas Hospital in London and Mrs. Sarah Wardroper became the director. Nurses in training learned mostly with hands-on experience, and minimal book study. Miss Nightingale scrutinized the nurses' reports and logs to make sure they were learning what they needed to know. Following their training, Miss Nightingale invited nurses to tea and gave them books before they were sent off to hospitals throughout Britain, and to set up Nightingale Training Centers abroad in Europe and the United States.
Although Nightingale believed that disease developed spontaneously in unsanitary conditions, her insistence on the necessity of cleanliness lead to a dramatic decrease in the spread of disease.
In November of 1856 a program was established to examine the Army's medical health, and Nightingale was part of it. By 1860 dramatic improvements had been made in Army medical care and barracks. In the following years she worked toward improvements in the India based British Army's conditions, as well as Indian public health and irrigation systems. She was instrumental in making British army statistics the best in Europe at the time, and as a result became the first woman to be elected as a fellow of the Statistical Society.
Florence Nightingale was bedridden with illness in her later years, but received numerous awards for her lifetime of accomplishments. She became the first woman to receive the British Order of Merit in 1907. Florence Nightingale died at the age of 90 on August 13, 1910. After her death nurses throughout the world wanted to pay tribute to her, and the Florence Nightingale Foundation was formed to carry on the work of educating nurses. It continues to operate near St. Thomas Hospital in London.
