THE MATRIARCH OF MODERN NURSING

The English nurse Florence Nightingale was the founder

of modern nursing and made outstanding contributions
to knowledge of public health.
(1820-1910)
•FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE was
born at Villa La Columbia, Florence
Italy on May 12, 1820 of wealthy
parents.

•Her father, William Edward

Nightingale, was heir to a Derbyshire
estate. Her mother, Fanny Nightingale,
was a solid merchant.

•She had a stronger strain that

demanded independence, dominance in
some field of activities and obedience to
God by selfless service to society.
FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE
•As she grew up, her father provided her with a reputable
education, which was uncommon for a Victorian woman (Woman
in those times were not educated as well as men).

•Nightingale was a linguist; had a vast knowledge of science,

mathematics, literature, and the arts; was well read in Philosophy,
history, politics and economics; and was well- informed about the
workings of government and political science. Her Aunt Mai, a
devoted relative, described her as being a highly intellectual being.

•At seventeen she felt herself to be called by God to some unnamed

great cause. Florence had a firm faith in God, she was a Unitarian
Christian, and for a time believed she had a religious calling.
•Florence's mother, Fanny Nightingale, also came from a
staunch Unitarian family. Fanny was a domineering woman
who was primarily concerned with finding her daughter a
good husband. She was therefore upset by Florence's
decision to reject Lord Houghton's offer of marriage.
Florence refused to marry several suitors, and at the age of
twenty-five told her parents she wanted to become a nurse.

•She wanted to do more with her life than become an

inactive wife of an aristocrat. Her parents were totally
opposed to the idea as nursing was associated with working
class women.
•In 1844 Nightingale decided to work in hospitals. Her family
furiously resisted her plan, on the ostensible ground that nurses
were not "ladies" but menial drudges, usually of questionable
morals.

•Florence's desire to have a career in medicine was reinforced when

she met Elisabeth Blackwell at St. Bartholomew's Hospital in
London. Blackwell was the first woman to qualify as a doctor in the
United States. Blackwell, who had to overcome considerable
prejudice to achieve her ambition, encouraged her to keep trying
and in 1851 Florence's father gave her permission to train as a nurse
•At the age of 31, she managed to do some
private nursing and then she spent 14 days at
Kaiserwerth, a German school and hospital,
built by Theodore Fleidner, a protestant
pastor, after her trip to Egypt.

•She applied for admission to the school with THEODORE FLEIDNER

a 12-page handwritten “curriculum” showing
her interest of becoming a nurse and entered
the nursing program on July 6, 1851 as the
134th nursing student to attend the Fleidner
School of Nursing.
•She left Kaiserwerth on October 7, 1851, and was considered to be
educated as nurse.

• In 1853 she became superintendent of the London charity-supported

Institution for Sick Gentlewomen in Distressed Circumstances. This
opportunity allowed her to achieve effective independence from her
family and also to try out novel techniques of institutional organization
and management, conducted in a scientific, nonsectarian spirit.

•In October 1854 Nightingale organized a party of 38 nurses, mostly from

various religious orders, for service in the Crimean War, the battle of
English versusTurkish.
CRIMEAN WAR
 "THE LADY WITH LAMP"

•With her lamp, Nightingale

traversed the night during the
war to look for wounded
soldiers and to heal them with
her consoling hands.
•Nightingale went to the front of
Crimean war at the request of
her friend, Sir Sidney Herbert,
Secretary at war at Great
Britain.
“The lady with lamp”
•They arrived at Constantinople in November 5, 1854.
Conditions at the British base hospital at Scutari were appalling
and grew steadily worse as the flow of sick and wounded
soldiers from the Crimea rapidly increased.

•Nightingale’s 19th month stay at military was hard for

many to accept. The hospital barracks were infested with
fleas and rats, and sewage flowed under the wards. She
used her superb statistical and managerial skills to make
drastic changes in the mortality rate of the soldiers and
victims of war.
•The mortality rate at the
hospital was 42.7% of those
treated; a mortality rate which
was higher from disease than
from injuries.

• Six months after, the mortality

rate at the hospital went down
to 2.2%. She achieved this drop
in mortality by attending to the
environment of the soldiers.
•In 1856 Florence returned to England as a national heroine.
She had been deeply shocked by the lack of hygiene and
elementary care that the men received in the British Army.
Nightingale therefore decided to begin a campaign to improve
the quality of nursing in military hospitals.

•Her well- known theory was the Environmental Theory.

•In October, 1856, she had a long interview with Queen Victoria
and Prince Albert and the following year gave evidence to the 1857
Sanitary Commission. This eventually resulted in the formation of
the Army Medical College.

•Nightingale was truly a skilled nurse; she was an expert statistician

who used statistics to present her case for hospital reform. She was
viewed as the pioneer in the graphic display of statistics and was
selected a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society in 1858.

•In 1874 an honorary membership in the American Statistical

Association was bestowed to her. Give her dependence on
observable data to support her position, it can be said that
Nightingale was the first nurse researcher.
•To spread her opinions on reform, Nightingale published two
books, Notes on Hospital (1859) and Notes on Nursing (1859). With
the support of wealthy friends and John Delane at The Times,
Nightingale was able to raise £59,000 to improve the quality of
nursing. In 1860, she used this money to found the Nightingale
School & Home for Nurses at St. Thomas's Hospital. She also
became involved in the training of nurses for employment in the
workhouses that had been established as a result of the 1834 Poor
Law Amendment Act.

•Nightingale held strong opinions on women’s rights . In her book

Suggestions for Thought to Searchers after Religious Truths (1859)
she argued strongly for the removal of restrictions that prevented
women having careers.
•Nightingale’s work, the Environmental Theory, was recognized
through numerous awards she gained from Great Britain and
many other countries. Notably, she was the first woman to be
granted the ORDER OF MERIT (OM) and ROYAL RED
CROSS (RRC) by no less than Queen Victoria of Great Britain.
During her time, she was the second most famous British person
after the Queen herself.
•Nightingale was able to work into her eighties and died in
her sleep on August 13, 1910 at the ripe age of 90. She is
honored each year in a commemorative service at St.
Margaret’s Church, East Wellow, Great Britain, where she is
buried. The news of her death spread across the world, and
she instantly became a celebrated and legendary person.

•Her birthday marks the International Nurses Day

Celebration each year.
 “ I THINK ONE’S
FEELINGS WASTE
THEMSELVES IN
WORDS; THEY OUGHT
TO BE DISTILLED INTO
ACTIONS WHICH BRING
RESULTS.”

-FLORENCE
NIGHTINGALE