The Concept of Knowledge

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The Concept of Knowledge
Michelle L. Jones, RN, BSN
Murray State University
NUR 900

The Concept of Knowledge
Introduction—Nursing Knowledge
Nursing knowledge is the means by which the whole purpose of caring for patients is achieved because it is what we acutually do. It is what defines us as nurses as opposed to similar professions such as doctors and it helps differentiate us from lay workers or other support workers. Knowledge is basically what classifies us as professionals having a unique body of knowledge as one of the things that define a profession in a society. In the following pages, I will discuss the meaning of knowledge, how it relates to me, and my hopes of becoming a nursing faculty instructor.
Scholarship and Practice
Nursing has two faces. To the public, nurses embody the best of modern health care. Efficient, effective, and caring, nurses are the center of the patient’s experience. The other face is largely invisible to the patient, even though it has been a part of nursing since the time of Florence Nightingale. Nursing requires knowledge. In the first century of nursing, the intellectual dimensions of nursing remained implicit. Nurses were trained using an apprenticeship model. Long hours at the bedside were supplemented by some pearls of wisdom dispensed by physicians. By the middle of the twentieth century, it became clear that effective nursing proactive required a distinctive body of knowledge. Nursing intervention had gradually become independent of the physicians orders, and nursing required integrated knowledge of the physiological, psychological, and social dimensions of the patient. By developing programs of research, nurses asserted ownership over the knowledge required for practice and this is the reason I am returning to school. With this advanced degree, I hope to increase my knowledge of nursing practice
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