Concise History of Nursing

Nursing is a career that dates to 250 B.C. It began as a male-dominated field, but over the years became dominated by women. Originally, nurses performed basic maid-type duties, but their role has since evolved into a respected medical profession.

Beginning

• Documentation of the first nurses and nursing school comes from India around 250 B.C. The Benedictines started a nursing order 200 years later, and in the 1300s nurses cared for victims of the Black Death.

Male Nurses

• Men were supposedly more pure than women, which is why they were the ones allowed to learn nursing. They dominated the field from 250 B.C. until the late 1800s.

Florence Nightingale

• Florence Nightingale is known as the founder of modern nursing. She began working in hospitals in the mid-1800s and later trained in Germany as a nurse. She led nursing reform and organized nursing care.

Early Training

• In the 1900s, nurses were trained in hospitals and were taught to clean and sanitize, then worked as private-duty nurses.

Modern Nurses

• In the 1940s, nurses trained in the Cadet Nurse Corps during World War II. They learned psychiatry, anesthesia and other areas of medicine. This is when women began to dominate the field.