Abstract

Background: The purpose of the study is to understand Florence Nightingale’s core ideas on nursing. “Hospitals, are only an intermediate stage of civilization”. She considered it necessary to reduce the demand for hospitals in the future, and focused on private homes as alternative spaces for care as they provide “optimal opportunities for all sick persons to maintain their health and achieve recovery”. She set the ultimate goal of all nursing is: “to nurse all sick at home”. Although the primary factor of home nursing is actually practicing nursing, it is necessary for visiting nurses not only to perform nursing techniques for care-receivers, but also to influence the mental aspects of their lives, and improve their attitudes toward daily life.
Methods: This study is a qualitative study and it will employ literary analysis. It will retrospectively examined the literature created by her 150 years ago, revealing that her idea of home nursing and detailed strategies to practice it are also innovative and useful under our present circumstances.
Results: Based on the literary analysis, practical nursing skills, visiting techniques, and an ability to educate are essential. Home nursing also gives encouragement that promotes life-fulfillment in ordinary unremarkable, and daily life activities. It is easier to create environments that enable the sick to maintain the routine of their daily lives, and retain their identities in their own homes. Nightingale coined the phrase, home nursing combining ‘home’ and ‘nursing’, and also defined its concept.
Conclusion: It is possible to clarify the present, and consequently provide future perspectives only by examining their relationships with the past. This study by analysis Nightingale’s views on hospitals can help us deal with the demographic and economic challenges facing health systems in Japan.