Nursing History
History provides current nurses with the same intellectual and political tools that
determined nursing pioneers applied to shape nursing values and beliefs to the social
context of their times. Nursing history is not an ornament to be displayed on anniversary
days, nor does it consist of only happy stories to be recalled and retold on special occasions.
Nursing history is a vivid testimony, meant to incite, instruct and inspire today's nurses as
they bravely trod the winding path of a reinvented health care system.
To find out about these nursing pioneers and their efforts, link up with the American
Association for the History of Nursing, Inc.
About AAHN
The American Association for the History of Nursing (AAHN ) is a professional organization
open to everyone interested in the history of nursing. Originally founded in 1978 as a historical
methodology group, the association was briefly named the International History of Nursing
Society. The purpose of the Association shall be to foster the importance of history as relevant to
understanding the past, defining the present, and influencing the future of nursing by:
Stimulating national and international interest and collaboration in the history of nursing;
Educating nurses and the public regarding the history and heritage of the nursing profession;
Encouraging and supporting research in the history of nursing and recognizing outstanding scholarly achievement
in nursing history;
Encouraging the collection, preservation, and use of materials of historical importance to nursing;
Serving as a resource for information about nursing history;
Producing and distributing educational materials related to the history and heritage of the nursing profession;
Promoting the inclusion of nursing history in nursing curricula;
Fostering interdisciplinary collaboration in history
History of Nursing Organizations
American Association of Nurse Anesthetists
American College of Nurse Midwives
American College of Nurse Practitioners
American Nurses Association
American Red Cross History
American Society of PeriAnesthesia Nurses (ASPAN)
Association of Critical-Care Nurses (ACCN)
Association of periOperative Registered Nurses (AORN)
Association of Women's Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses (AHONN)
Case Managment Society of America
Emergency Nurses Association
NANDA Internationa North American Nursing Diagnosis Associationl
National League for Nursing History
Finding aid to the records of NLN
National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses
National Black Nurses Association
Society of Urologic Nurses
Wound, Ostomy and Continence Nurses Society
Since the earliest times, men and women have been engaged in the practices we today call
nursing. These individuals combined biological, nutritional, social, aesthetic, and spiritual
support to optimize the health of their communities. While they have been called medicine men
or witch doctors, these terms indicate a lack of their contribution, and that the healer may have
been either gender. If we examine the practices they are very similar to what we know today as
community health nursing.