Chapter 26
THE NURSE OF THE FUTURE
The student of life and of the sciences which deal with the origin and development of the human race, and with the relations of man to man and nation to nation--such sciences as biology and anthropology, sociology and ethics and history--comes to the conclusion that life exists for the development of mind. And mind is not merely intellect, but the only gateway we know to character, to soul. The deepest students of human science see no reason for life except as it "evolves" a perfect mind--man's goal, his ideal. And this visioned perfect mind is one which adjusts itself without friction to the body, making it fulfil the laws of health that it may help and not hinder mind's progress; one which adjusts itself to people and things, co-operating with other minds to develop manners and customs and laws of the most satisfactory community living; one which forces things to be servants of its will; one which makes harmony of life by fulfilling the laws of the soul as well as of the intellect and of the body.
If we believe that life exists for the development of mind into a force of intellect and character and soul, then we need not ask why a nurse should know something of the laws of mind. She does not ask why she should know anatomy or pathology. Her work is dependent upon such knowledge. But if the center of life, the thing which makes the body a living, moving, acting agent instead of a clod, is mind; if the one thing which makes a difference between animal life and mineral and vegetable life is consciousness, _i. e._, mind; and if everything that affects that body, its organ, affects mind also--then surely no nurse can afford to learn only the rules of repair or of keeping in order the instrument of consciousness, without knowing what effect her efforts have on the mind itself. It is as though an ignorant maid accepted a piano as merely a piece of furniture to be kept clean and shining, and in her zeal to that end scrubbed the keyboard with soap and water which, dripping down into the body of the instrument, swells and damages its felts, rusts and corrodes its keys, and ruins its notes. When she knows that she may thus make impossible the beautiful sounds she has heard it give, and that the more carefully the keyboard is handled the more sure is the beauty resulting, her care is to keep it as free as possible of dust, to see that the top is down and the keyboard covered when she sweeps--and to clean it hereafter in such a way as to never injure its tone.
The nurse has a much greater function than merely to help in saving the body and keeping its machinery in order. If the aim of life is the strengthening and perfecting of the mind--that "urge" of life, then surely the nurse's big aim will be to help establish such health of body as leads toward health of mind. In the average man or woman this vital urge becomes temporarily blocked by the very weakness of the body it urges. The body _must_ give the life-flame some fuel, or it dies out; but with very little fuel it flickers on, waiting, hoping for the more that it may burn strongly again. In the cases the nurse handles very often the "vital spark" has been poorly fed by the disabled body, and so discouragement or depression, or "loss of grip" results, or the flame continues to shine brightly with whatever little sustenance it receives, and so encourages the body to greater effort for it; or sinks into embers, glowing steadily though dully; or it burns wildly, recklessly--it becomes what we call "wild fire," that has no direction and no purpose save to burn up everything it can find.
In other words, the nurse deals with those in whom the "urge" is weakened--the depressed and discouraged; with those whose spirits never flag in their steady shining--those brave souls we could almost worship; and those others who hold grimly on with quiet grit and courage, but with no cheer; and with the unstable ones of neuropathic or psychopathic tendency who become hysteric or maniacal.
What will the nurse do for them all? Will not an understanding of how to recall the ambition to live, the will to get well, and the grit to see the thing through, be an incalculable asset.
THE NURSE OF THE FUTURE
The nurse of the future will not be merely a handmaiden to care for the sick body by deftly carrying out the doctor's orders. She will do this almost automatically as a matter of course, and skilfully; but it will be the merest beginning of her mission. That mission itself will be to eliminate the causes of disease; to teach the ways of health, to supervise the sanitary conditions of city, town, and country. Practical ways and the wise means to this end will be taught in her hospital, which will become a community center with clinics, teaching through its doctors and nurses the way to health, instead of merely treating and advising the cases as they come. But the greatest contribution of the nurse of the future will be a wide-spread _desire for health_ and _will to health_, rather than a desire and will to avoid discomfort and pain and danger of death. This _will to health_ will doom in the sane mind the disease-accepting attitude. It will do all that common sense and applied medical science can do to strengthen the body; then it will take what life brings in the way of unavoidable disease and weakness and inability, with an uncringing mind. It will hold the mind's attitude to serenity and poise and accomplishment within the necessary limits of its disordered body. It will be master of its dwelling and make the most of the little the body can give, and force all bearable weakness and pain to be stepping-stones to endurance and will-strength and cheer. It will not accept physical limitations as final things. If life must be lived in a prison-house it will be its own jailer, and fill the rooms with flowers, music, friends, and happiness.
No nurse is competent to help her patient to overcome any curable physical weakness, and keep the mind serene in the face of the incurable, until she herself has learned that the will to health is capable of transforming disease of body, from disaster, into health of mind and soul.
The nurse of the future will know the laws of mind as she knows the course of disease; she will be dedicated to such wise care of existing disease as will lead to prevention of future disease; and she will be a sworn, trained ally of the health-accepting mind.
INDEX
Absent-mindedness, 64
Absolutes, 54
Abstract concept, 52 object concepts, 53 quality concepts, 53
Accuracy of perception, 141
Action cannot be separated from feeling, 68
Acts, compulsive, 106
Adaptability, 79 necessity of, 80
Amnesia, 103
Anesthesia, 101
Aphasia, 103
Apperception, 54
Association of ideas, 143
Attention, 79 of interest, 112 of reason and will, 118 root of disease or health attitude, 112
Autosuggestion, 84
Awareness, 15
Bad habits, 91
Beginning of reason, 69
Body and mind, relation of, 40
Borderland disorders, 107
Brain, 33 hind, 43
Censor, 31
Central and peripheral nervous systems in action, 35
Cerebellum, 43
Cerebrum, 43 functions of, 45
Clear thinking, steps to, 140
Compulsive acts, 106 ideas, 103
Concentration, 146
Concepts, 52 abstract, 52 object, 53 quality, 53 concrete, 52
Concrete concepts, 52
Consciousness, 15, 20, 21 definition, 15 flow of, 47 in delirium, 32 in sleep, 31 is complex, 29 organs of, 34 personal, 57
Delirium, consciousness in, 32
Deluded patient, 133 nursing of, 135
Delusion, 104 nihilistic, 104 of reference, 104 somatic, 104
Determination, 18
Development of reason and will, 71
Disease attitude, attention, root of, 112
Disorders, 95 borderland, 107 of emotion, 99 of functions of intellect, 96 of ideation, 97 of judgment, 99 of memory, 98 of perception, 96 of reason, 98 of sensation, 96 of will, 99
Disorientation, 103
Distractibility, 105
Effort, habit a conserver of, 90
Emotion, 18, 45, 49 disorders of, 99 the place of, 67
Emotional equilibrium, 152 reaction, normal, 77
Environment as cause of variation from normal mental processes, 109
Equilibrium, emotional, 152
False associations, mind a prey to, 137
Feeling, 49 cannot be separated from action, 68 from thinking, 67 from will, 68
Fixed idea, 103
Flight of ideas, 102
Forebrain, 43
Future, the nurse of the, 164
Getting other man's point of view, 126 patient's point of view, 124
Habit a conserver of effort, 90 bad, 91 hospital, 92
Habit-formation, 79
Hallucination, 101
Health and psychology, 79 attitude, attention, root of, 112
Heredity as course of variation from normal mental processes, 108
Hind brain, 43
Hospital habit, 92
How to study, 146
Hurt, 70
Hyperesthesia, 101
Hypersuggestability, 84
Hypochondriasis, 102, 108
Hysteria, 107
Idea, compulsive, 103 fixed, 103
Ideas, association of, 143 flight of, 102
Ideation, 52 disorders of, 97
Ideogenous pains, 103
Illusion, 101
Imagination, 58
Impulses, insane, 108
Inhibition, morbid, 104
Inorganic memory, 52
Insane impulses, 108
Insanity, 107
Instinct, 59
Instincts, list of, 61
Intellect, 18, 45 functions of, disorders of, 96
Interest, attention of, 112
Judgment, 56, 72 disorders of, 99
Life, mental, 14 conditions of, 19 phenomena of, 15
Mania, 107
Melancholia, 107
Memory, 51, 62 disorders of, 98 inorganic, 52 organic, 51 self-training in, 150
Mental disability, states of, 100 life, 14 conditions of, 19 phenomena of, 15 processes, normal, variations from, 95, 101 factors causing, 108
Mind, 14, 33 a prey to false associations, 137 and body, relation of, 40 functions of, 50 normal, 47, 77
Mood, 49
Morbid inhibition, 104
Motion, 26
Movement, 26
Mutism, 106
Necessity of adaptability, 80
Negativism, 106
Nervous systems, central and peripheral, in action, 35 sympathetic, 37
Nervousness, 106
Neurasthenia, 108
Neuropath, 108
Neurosis, 106 from psychosis, 82
Neurotic, 108
Nihilistic delusion, 104
Normal emotional reactions, 77
Normal mental processes, variations from, 95, 101 factors causing, 108 mind, 47, 77
Nurse of the future, 164 psychology of, 139
Nursing deluded patient, 135
Obsessed patient, 136
Obsession, 105
One thought replaced by another, 89
Organic memory, 51
Organs of consciousness, 34
Overactivity, psychomotor, 106
Pain, 69 ideogenous, 103
Patient, deluded, 133 nursing of, 135 obsessed, 136
Patient's point of view, getting, 124 what determines it, 124
Percept, 51, 52
Perception, 51 accuracy of, 141 disorders of, 96 training of, 142
Peripheral and central nervous systems in action, 35
Personal consciousness, 57 reactions as cause of variation from normal mental processes, 110
Personality, psychopathic, 108 shut-in, 104
Perversions, 95, 101
Phenomena of mental life, 15
Phobia, 108
Place of emotion, 67
Pleasure, 69
Point of view, getting other man's, 126 patient's, getting, 124 what determines it, 124
Poor memory, 64
Power of suggestion, 84
Premise, 72
Protozoön, consciousness in, 15
Psychasthenia, 108
Psychology and health, 79 definition, 12 of the nurse, 139
Psychomotor overactivity, 106 retardation, 106
Psychoneurosis, 106
Psychopathic personality, 108
Psychosis, 107 neurosis from, 82
Pugnacious instinct, 60
Reactions, normal emotional, 77 proportioned to stimuli, 75
Reason, 56 and will, attention of, 118 development of, 71 beginning of, 69 disorders of, 98
Reference, delusion of, 104
Relation of mind and body, 40
Retardation, psychomotor, 106
Saving power of will, 93
Science, 13
Second-nature, 90
Self-correction, 160
Self-training in memory, 150
Sensation, 51 disorders of, 96
Sense of unreality, 104
Shut-in personality, 104
Sleep, consciousness in, 31
Somatic delusion, 104
Steps to clear thinking, 140
Stimuli, reaction proportioned to, 75
Stimulus, definition, 22
Stream of thought, 50, 57
Study, how to, 146
Suggestibility, 79
Suggestion, power of, 84
Sympathetic nervous system, 37
The unconscious, 23
Thinking, 49, 58 cannot be separated from feeling, 67 clear, steps to, 140
Thought, stream of, 50, 57
Thought-substitution, 79
Tic, 105
Training perception, 142 the will, 161
Unconscious, the, 23
Universals, 53
Unreality, sense of, 104
Variations from normal mental processes, 95, 101 factors causing, 108
Volition, 45, 50
What determines patient's point of view, 124 we attend to determines what we are, 86
Will, 50, 79 and reason, attention of, 118 development of, 71 cannot be separated from feeling, 68 disorders of, 100 saving power of, 93 training of, 161
=A Short History=
=of Nursing=
From the Earliest Times to the Present Day
By =Lavinia L. Dock, R.N.= Secretary, International Council of Nurses
In Collaboration with =Isabel Maitland Stewart, A.M., R.N.= Assistant Professor, Department of Nursing and Health, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York
_12^o. Price, $3.00_
=This New Volume Has Been Prepared Especially= =for the Use of Student Nurses=
It is, in effect, a condensation of the four volumes of the larger _History of Nursing_, prepared by Miss Dock in collaboration with Miss Nutting, a work which has been considered standard on the subject, but which, by its very nature, was too elaborate for class use. This condition has now been overcome by condensation into this single, comprehensive, inexpensive volume of all the salient facts of the larger work.
It is generally believed that the best place in the nursing curriculum for the History of Nursing is in the early part of the first year, when the student is just beginning to form her conception of nursing, and is being initiated into its traditions.
=The Many Excellent Features of this= =_Short History of Nursing_=
will inevitably bring it into use in a very great number of Hospital Training Schools; it should, of course, be in the library of every Hospital which does not maintain a Training School. It is believed that it will be found to be
=The Best Volume on This Important Subject=
(_Over_)
=Some of the=
=Putnam Nursing Books=
=Maxwell and Pope's Practical Nursing= Price $2.50.
=Cadmus' Manual of Obstetrical Nursing= Approximate price $1.50.
=Dock's Materia Medica for Nurses= Price $2.25.
=Higgins' Psychology of Nursing= Price $2.50.
=Pope's Manual of Nursing Procedure= Price $2.40.
=Pope's Essentials of Anatomy and Physiology for Nurses= 600 pages. Price $2.90.
=Pope's Quiz Book for Nurses= 485 pages. Price $2.50.
=Dock and Nutting's History of Nursing= In four volumes. Illustrated volumes 1 and 2, price $7.50. Volumes 3 and 4, price $7.50.
=Dock and Stewart's Short History of Nursing= One volume, 400 pages. Price $3.00.
=Pope's Physics and Chemistry for Nurses= 450 pages. Price $2.50.
Arthur W. Isca Medical and Nurse Books Besse Building Minneapolis, Minnesota
* * * * *
Transcriber's Note: Here is a list of corrected errors. Line numbers count from the start of the book itself not including the Transcriber's Note. Alternatively, use the HTML version, in which the errors are marked.
l780: ecstacy changed to ecstasy l1258: Missing full-stop in i. e. l1665: or changed to of l1766: pasttime changed to pastime l1867: strees changed to stress l1883: council changed to counsel l1994: , changed to . l2324: em-dash changed to hyphen l2588: hypochondrasis changed to hypochondriasis l2817: successfuly changed to successfully l3334: stubborness changed to stubbornness l4120: in changed to is l4198: weakenss changed to weakness
The inconsistent hyphenation of hypo-mania is as in the original.
End of Project Gutenberg's Applied Psychology for Nurses, by Mary F. Porter