Abstract
This article traces the historical development of nursing ethics from the age of Nightingale to the present globalized age and provides an overview of ethical issues and future perspectives on nursing. The nursing profession commenced with sacred work values, and for a long time, a nurse’s primary role was to be a physician’s loyal helpers. However, from the 1970s onward, mainly influenced by the thoughts of the times in the USA, it enhanced its professional autonomy, and nurses came to play a role of patients’ advocates in order to protect patient’s interests and rights based on nursing advocacy. With the opening of the age of globalization, this also affected the nursing profession. Specifically, it is now facing the issue of the migration of the nursing workforce from poor countries to wealthier countries, which has led to serious problems, including unfairness and gap expansion in health care. It is also facing the issue of how to develop cross-cultural nursing in the world where different cultures intermix. This article presents a possible global basis for nursing ethics so as to promote ethical nursing under such an unprecedented circumstance.
Aiko Sawada is retired
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Leininger, M. (Ed.). (1991). Cultural care diversity and universality: A theory of nursing. New York: National League for Nursing Press.
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Zimmermann, M. K., Litt, J. S., & Bose, C. E. (2006). Global dimensions of gender and carework. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
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Sawada, A. (2015). Nursing Ethics. In: ten Have, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Global Bioethics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05544-2_311-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05544-2_311-1
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