Caring, researching and teaching: meanings and implications of nursing practice

This article aims to discuss the problem of caring, researching and teaching in hospital nursing: general characteristics of Modern Nursing -- teaching and practice paradigm; characteristics of the Nightingale System. The research methodology was based on the analysis of fundamental care, research and teaching concepts in nursing practice, involving technical and gnoseological implications for pedagogical and research practice, which are illustrated through examples of hospital research. These entail repercussions for an epistemology of nursing. We highlight professional attitudes for the state of the art. The author evokes the need for disclosure, for efficient research methods and result reliability in (oncology?) nursing care, research and teaching activities. The conclusion points towards the relevance of nursing as a social practice and the problem of nursing activities in any area of care pragmatics -- whether in or outside the hospital context.