International Nurses Day, May 12 is a worldwide celebration of Nursing on the anniversary of Florence Nightingale's birth. In 2022, the theme for International Nurses Day is Nurses: A Voice to Lead – Invest in nursing and respect rights to secure global health. #IND2022 focuses on the need to invest in nursing and respect the rights…
Dr. Lorraine Wright and I are pleased to announce that we have accepted an invitation to offer a 4-day Family Externship workshop at Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW) from July 5-8, 2022. This will be the 6th time we have been invited to offer a Family Externship at ZHAW. (We were able to virtually offer…
“The days are long, but the years are short.” ~ Gretchen Rubin "The first issue of the Journal of Family Nursing (JFN), owned SAGE Publishing, was launched in February 1995. This year marks the 25th anniversary of the founding of this journal dedicated to extending knowledge about family nursing and transforming practice with families. There is no other nursing…
First International Family Nursing Conference Participants with Dr. Lorraine Wright and Dr. Maureen Leahey (1988) The First International Family Nursing Conference was hosted in May 1988 by the University of Calgary, Faculty of Nursing and chaired by Dr. Lorraine M. Wright (450 participants from 15 countries attended this first conference). In 2021 the 15th International…
There is a growing conversation happening on Twitter within my family nursing community by #familynursing and #familyhealth scholars, practitioners, advocates, and organizations. Here is a list of of those who are currently active on Twitter (list updated (March 2020). I urge you to harness the power of Twitter to promote and advance #familynursing and #familyhealth. Check out Wendy Looman's…
I've been thinking a lot about the struggle we have to make ideas "stick". In my work of creating and disseminating family nursing knowledge, I invite nurses to change their beliefs and behavior about families and "get" the benefits that exist for families and nurses when families are included in health care. Chip Heath and…
What is clinical scholarship, you ask? It is a form of knowledge creation that focuses on being immersed in clinical practice, observing practice, analyzing practice, and synthesizing what you have learned from practice (Bell, 2003; Diers, 1995). It is not formal research per se, but a distant cousin; recognized as a form of scholarship but…
Photo credit: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/398076054549131026/ There are a number of voices across several disciplines who are actively participating in the growing scholarly conversation about family focused health care in North America and beyond (Bell, 2017). In a Journal of Family Nursing Special Focus Issue on Social Media and Family Nursing, February 2017, Isaacson and Looman (2017) discuss…
"May this be a house of courage, Where healing and growth are loved, Where dignity and forgiveness prevail; A home where patience of spirit is prized, And the sight of the destination is never lost Though the journey be difficult and slow." ~ Adapted from John O'Donahue, To Bless the Space Between Us This…
Credit: National Academy of Medicine As a family nursing scholar, my greatest desire is to shift the emphasis of health care from the individual to the FAMILY and from tasks and technology to RELATIONSHIPS. I am delighted there are many organizations and individuals around the world who share my mission, including the International Family Nursing…