Florence Nightigale is known as the first nursing theorist as she worked in the field of nursing for decades and proved to be a pioneer in this field. She focused on a serene and clean environment in healing process of a patient. In her Notes on Nursing: What it is, What is not (1860), she has listed her work on nursing practices that works as bible for nurses in the modern world. Specifically theories and concepts related to nursing are influenced by her work.
Environmental Theory
Her Environmental theory is a significant theory that emphasizes on a safe, clean, and quiet environment in the healing process of the patients. Her theory of Environmental effects states that nursing itself is a process of using the surroundings and environment in order to support a patient in recovery. This means that a nurse should be proactive in taking steps to make environment calm, clean, and quiet so as to restore the patient’s health in a gradual manner.
She also indicated that the external factors influence the healing process of a patient to a great degree by directly impacting the physiological and biological aspects. She also provided a detailed account of those factors that are present in the health care environment and affect the patient. One of these factors is the pure and fresh air, which means air that is as fresh and pure as the external air and does not cause chilling effect to the patient. She also emphasized on not using the tap water and domestic water for the hydration of patients as water may be contaminated by the disease-carrying germs.
Moreover, she put a significant emphasize on the importance of a proper sewerage system and cleanliness of the healthcare facility. She termed cleanliness as an integral part of nursing. She also focused on using the appropriate level of light in curing the patient. In this regard, sunlight is important to treat many patients. If these factors are not taken care of, patients may be prone to infections and diminishing health status instead of healing from a disease.
The Environmental theory transformed the untidy and shabby nursing units into clean and quiet health care facilities in Nightingale’s time. According to her, noise-free environment and a cozy place is very important in aiding the healing process as patients usually get annoyed and irritated by a noisy surrounding. The dietary intake and food taken by the patient should be recorded well and an assessment of food intake should be done on the basis of this record. In this way, a clean, calm, and quiet health care facility is not an invention of the present time but the mother of Nursing had already made it a part of professional nursing practice.