Teaching history to nurses : will this make me a better nurse?

Nursing has a long and rich past. Yet this is rarely conveyed to undergraduate nursing students resulting in nurses devaluing the achievements of earlier nurses. It is argued here that studying the history of nursing has a number of benefits for undergraduate students as well as the profession at large. It provides students with a realistic understanding of nursing and what has influenced past developments to bring us to the present situation. As such, it provides students with the context of nursing practice and thus a firm foundation for other nursing courses to build upon. In addition, studying the history of nursing, especially at the beginning of the undergraduate program, builds fundamental critical thinking skills by encouraging students to question the evidence before them and to seek out influencing factors or ‘the bigger picture’. These issues are outlined in this paper, along with factors to consider when teaching the history of nursing to students, including the information presented, what approach to take, teaching strategies and resources

Partnerships and the past: Reflections on 1940s community centre endeavours of the National Fitness Council

© Australian Health Promotion Association 2016.Issue addressed Multisectoral and multilevel partnerships have been used in Australia since the 1940s to promote health. Examination of historical partnerships can offer insights into current practice. Methods Historical method was used to analyse archival material regarding the role of the National Fitness Council (NFC) and its partnerships under the Federal Government's program to establish community centres. Results Inadequate funding, messy organisational structures, a broadly defined goal and limited capacity within the NFC inhibited its work in regards to community centres. Conclusions Although the policy of establishing community centres was ultimately unsuccessful, this examination has analysed the partnerships between the NFC and various levels of governments, and the effect of the political and economic context on them. So what? Current health promotion practitioners can draw on the past to gain insight into potential problems and issues

Nursing, nurses and their work in Rockhampton: 1930 - 1950

This dissertation has used an historical approach to investigate nursing at the Rockhampton Hospital between 1930 and 1950. It has focussed on the work practices of those nurses who carried out the majority of the work, the trainee nurses. The work practices examined include those related to infection control, treatments and interventions, monitoring activities and ward management issues such as hierarchical structure and communication. This dissertation has placed nursing history at the centrepoint of three related disciplinary fields - medical, labour and women's history. This has allowed some of the origins of the rituals, traditions and culture of nursing to be identified. In particular the image of nurses as the doctor's handmaiden has been examined. This dissertation has revealed that while a large proportion of nursing activities were regulated by doctors, nurses controlled a significant amount of their work. This dissertation has, therefore, supported and challenged the foundations of the handmaiden image.</p

Using the past to strengthen the present : intersections between oral history and community resilience

Community resilience has gained increased political and research attention over the past decade. However, it is a concept that has yet to gain the full attention of community oral history practitioners and historians. This paper outlines a community oral history project focused on exploring community resilience within a small regional Queensland town after it was impacted by two flood events in 2011. It draws out a strong social narrative of townsfolk being resilient in the face of adversity from the origins of the town. Synergies are explored between oral history and community resilience which suggest community oral history projects can play a role in supporting community resilience

Nursing history : foundations of a profession

Considers the historical foundations of professional nursing in Australia. Introduces a number of factors that have influenced the evolution of nursing and explores the constructs upon which professional nursing has been buil

Nursing history : foundations of a profession

Nursing history : foundations of a professio

Evaluation and creative placemaking: Using a critical realist model to explore the complexity

In the complex reality of community-based arts and health, it is rare for a direct causal link to be established between any particular project and health and well-being outcomes. Based on a realist retrospective evaluation of a small number of creative placemaking projects, this article presents an integrative model to help conceptualize creative placemaking evaluation according to context, mechanisms and tangible and intangible outcomes and impacts. These include proximal and distal outcomes, some of which may be related to the health and well-being of individuals and communities. The implications of this model for practitioners and researchers include being able to accommodate the range of stakeholders typically involved in creative placemaking projects and to expand the evaluation focus to account for context and mechanisms and outcomes and impacts. The model provides a useful theoretical framework for both practice and research

'There and back again': International Collaboration for Participatory Health Researchers' journeys to evidence based practice and practice based evidence

Based on oral histories, this paper outlines the individual and collective stories of eight members of the International Collaboration for Participatory Health Research (ICPHR): how they came to embrace participatory action research within a health context; challenges they faced; and how they came together to strengthen and develop their understanding of their research practice. In particular, their collaboration provided for discourse around research rigour related to community relevance and impact. While they initially formed the ICPHR in response to Evidence Based Practice imperatives, they came instead to understand their work more as Practice Based Evidence

Private duty nursing : the last days in Central Queensland

Private duty nursing plummeted from being the pinnacle of a nurse's carrer in 1900 to being almost non-existent by the 1970's. This paper explores the nature of private duty nursing in the 1960's and 1970's and seeks to identify factors contributing to the demise of this avenue of work. Three former nurses from Rockhampton, Queensland, were interviewed as part of an oral history project. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed within a historical context. The main factors identified as impacting on private nursing by the 1970's were the opening up of opportunities for married nurses to gain part-time employment in hospitals, the increasing level of technology associated with high dependancy patients, and improved wages and conditions of hospital nurses. While many of the factors relating to the decline of private duty nursing are no longer relevant, other issues that emerged from this study, such as professional isolation, working environments and the ability of the patient to pay for nursing services, warrant consideration by contemporary nurses entering private practice

"All at sea" : an activity theory analysis of first year nursing students learning to write academic essays

Learning to write an academic essay can be a daunting experience for a first year undergraduate student. This paper explores this experience using data collected from a survey of sixteen first year nursing students as part of a small teaching and evaluation project. It uses Activity Theory to guide my reflections on the process students undertake when learning to use the library and the protocols of academic writing, and to analyse comments made by students regarding the resources they accessed throughout their first term, and their perceived levels of confidence in this process. Activity Theory allows various aspects influencing the students in this process to be explored separately, as well as highlighting potential tensions within the system that need to be considered. In this instance, two internal tensions were revealed: individual ways of doing things versus prescribed process; and expectations of student participation in their own learning versus student behaviour accessing and using resources. This analysis provides insight into the process students work through during their initial months undertaking tertiary study