Notes on Nursing

Florence Nightingale wrote this short book in 1859 not for professional nurses but for every woman who might have to care for a sick person at home. Her advice is practical and direct: fresh air, light, warmth, quiet, clean rooms and bedding, good food, and above all careful observation of the patient.

Written after her work with wounded soldiers during the Crimean War, Notes on Nursing shaped modern nursing and public health. Some of its medicine is outdated, but its attention to the patient's comfort and dignity is not. It is a reminder that care is a skill as well as a kindness.

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) was named after Florence, the city where she was born. Her wealthy family opposed her wish to become a nurse, but she trained in Germany, and in 1854 led a team of nurses to the British military hospital at Scutari during the Crimean War, where soldiers called her the Lady with the Lamp.

Back in England she used statistics, and diagrams she designed, to prove that most soldiers died of disease, not wounds, and to reform hospitals and sanitation. She founded a school of nursing at St Thomas' Hospital and wrote Notes on Nursing. She was the first woman to receive the Order of Merit.