PROFESSIONALISM

India, a prominent country in the Asian continent, has a long history of nursing care. Basically, one can understand that the approach to nursing profession has been improving as many young people take up the education in nursing profession as someone gets join in any other graduate program. Florence Nightingale, founder of modern nursing, was the first woman to have great influence over nursing in India and had a close knowledge of Indian conditions, especially in the army. The literature says that in 1865, Nightingale drew up some detailed “Suggestions on a system of nursing for hospitals in India”. Graduates were sent out from the Nightingale School of Nurses of St Thomas’ Hospital, England to start similar schools in India. St Stephen’s Hospital, Delhi was the first one to begin training the Indian women as nurses in 1867. Quality of education and clinical exposure to nursing students are also under constant updates in the country. The reason for this change is that majority of nurses trained in India tend to move to countries abroad especially countries like Australia, Canada, USA, UK and Europe too. Better pay and working conditions are attracting many, Indian nurses are also started moving towards the west, specially countries like Germany, Italy, Austria, Netherlands etc. There are also changes in the formation of nurses in India that they are also upgrading the level of nursing education into a bachelor’s degree. As per the Indian nursing council notification, from 2021 onward, nurses will only be trained with a bachelor’s degree (B.Sc) in nursing. Individuals need care and attention as long as they live. On the one hand, demographically, population and human life expectancy are increasing, and the care systems demands a lot of challenges and opportunities. On the other hand, experiments, and the efforts to overcome diseases continue. From the experiences from India, it is interesting to know that many young minds take up nursing studies when compare to paramedical courses. Nursing course is still the most likely job accelerated program in India among all other medical allied courses other than the Bachelor of Medicine program.