著者

宮脇 美保子

出版者

日本医学哲学・倫理学会

雑誌

医学哲学医学倫理 (ISSN:02896427)

巻号頁・発行日

no.21, pp.140-152, 2003-10-05

被引用文献数

1

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Nursing is an emerging profession trying to fulfill the criteria that define a true profession. The professional work of nursing is approached in a scientific manner. The nursing process is defined as an intellectual activity meant to be approached regularly and systematically now that the nursing process is the accepted method of professional practice. However, the nursing process is not the only capability required of nurses. The nursing process is nothing more than a problem-solving process by which nurses meet patients' needs. The patient's set of problems, referred to as the "nursing diagnosis," is undergoing international standardization. To standardize is to risk overshadowing the care that originally motivated the more scientific approach to solving patients' problem. Still more, with the increased complexity of medical care, nurses have taken over more and more of the activities associated with medical practice. Consequently, in the actual reality of practice, nurses sometimes lose sight of caring. What is the primary expertise to which nursing lays claim? So far, nurses have always valued the idea of caring for persons. Has nursing abandoned its caring role? Caring means that persons, the subjects of nursing care, are treated not as objects or impersonally but always in a way that considers the essence of the person, i. e., the opposite of mechanization and depersonalization. Also, what patients want and need most from nurses has been and still remains quality, humanized care. Therefore, nurses are challenged to enhance and develop the caring tradition of nursing as expressed through the nursing process.