Culture of nursing,preoccupation with prediction,and nursing intention

Culture is a series of rules and methods that a society has evolved to deal with the recurring problems it faces. These have become so basic that, like breathing, we no longer think about how we approach or resolve them.     

Dementia, personhood, and nursing: learning from a nursing situation

Appreciation of the personhood of people with dementia calls for care that looks beyond the disease to the person within. In this column the author discusses the concept of personhood for people with dementia and presents a method of teaching person-centered care developed within the theoretical framework of nursing as caring. The study of an aesthetic expression of a nursing situation, written by a nurse who cares for people with Alzheimer's disease in a nursing home, is presented to assist nurses to learn to see beyond the disease to the person and to develop relationships that nurture personhood.     

Nursing research, nursing theory and the nursing process

In recent years, practising nurses and nurse theorists have shown interest in the development of conceptual models of nursing and nursing theory. As yet, however, there exists little agreement concerning the most appropriate methodologies to be employed in such an exercise. This paper identifies a number of strategies which might usefully be adopted for this purpose. In particular, it distinguishes between inductive and hypothetico-deductive approaches to the development of nursing theory. It further attempts a clarification of the relationship between conceptual models of nursing and theories of nursing, and explores the use of the nursing process as a research technique which combines both inductive and hypothetico-deductive commitments. Finally, it argues that the systematic use of the nursing process may identify a set of research procedures with the potential to facilitate the development of nursing theory using insights from both the direct experience of practising nurses and from existing conceptual models of nursing.     

Social capital, rural nursing and rural nursing theory

The notion of social capital focuses attention on social connectedness within communities and the ways that this connectedness may affect health and well-being. There are many competing definitions of social capital but most suggest that it involves trust, social networks and reciprocity within communities, not necessarily geographically defined. The usefulness of social capital and related theories that help in understanding the function of nurses in rural communities are explored in this paper. Nurses and health service planners are becoming increasingly aware of the potential contribution of community nurses in rural and/or remote areas, as evidenced in the development of nurse practitioners. Through their interrelational role and status in rural communities, nurses are often 'immersed' or 'embedded' in the social networks that make up the fabric of rural life and may therefore be important contributors to social capital. For a concept such as social capital to be useful in nursing research, it must have distinct attributes, delineated boundaries, and well-described preconditions and outcomes in multiple contexts.     

Models of nursing, nursing practice and nurse education

Over the last few years, and concurrent with wider debates about the quality of patient care, increasing numbers of practising nurses and nurse educators have expressed interest in using conceptual models of nursing as a basis for planning and delivering nursing care. In the light of such interest, this paper identifies the distinctive features of three fundamental types of nursing model and explores the implications of these for contemporary approaches to nursing practice and nurse education.     

A critical intersection: human rights, public health nursing, and nursing ethics

Public health nurses must make moral decisions regarding practice in complex situations fraught with competing moral claims. While nurses often frame practice decisions within the context of ethical theory, consideration of human rights perspectives is more recent. Basic concepts of nursing and public health ethics and of human rights, in relationship to public health, will be discussed and related to the practice of public health nursing. Intersections of human rights, ethics, and public health nursing practice will be discussed in light of the assertion of health as a human right and described using the issues of HIV/AIDS and genetics/genomics.