Nurses have been fighting for changes in the healthcare systems throughout the decades. The prominent nurse leaders of the previous centuries have provided a foundation for today’s nurses to participate in advocacy in order to impact medicine and address public health issues. Bringing the historical perspective into the study of nursing advocacy helps to understand modern professionals’ role in making healthcare changes.
It is vital to revise several cases to depict how a nurse can utilize prominent specialists’ examples to understand the importance of political advocacy’s importance. For example, Lilian Wald tried to improve the health of society, especially that of immigrant families whose children studied at schools and were not eligible for receiving medications, by promoting an inclusion policy. As a result, her ideas were recognized, and there was a demand for school nurses (Nickitas et al., 2020). This instance demonstrates that a nurse can spread awareness on a state level, thereby involving others in policy promotion.
Wald also influenced the education of black nurses and healthcare in rural settings. Her attempts to fix the situations were fixed in the media, which sped the news among other professionals (Nickitas et al., 2020). Mary Breckenridge also fought to provide medical services in rural areas and managed to attract newspapers promoting her ideas. A nurse must use all the communication channels to raise awareness and attract others to policy advocacy. Several organizations, such as the American Red Cross and the National Association of Colored Graduates, provided African American nurses with work during the war, thereby encouraging the healthcare system to add an inclusion policy (Nickitas et al., 2020). This fact proves that major associations can influence any medical policy and improve public health.
Today’s nurses are expected to be politically active because they can shape national, state, or local health systems. As long as advocating in nursing existed, many people tried to change some policies. However, the attempts were unsuccessful because those stakeholders were barely concerned with medicine. The policy changes should be implemented only by those who deal with healthcare itself, and the nurses can impact today’s system based on the examples from the past.
Reference
Nickitas, D., Middaugh, D., & Feeg, V. (2020). Nursing history of advocacy and action. In S. Lewenson & D. Nickitas (Eds.). Policy and politics for nurses and other health professionals: Advocacy and action (pp. 3-23). Jones & Bartlett Learning.