Biography of Florence Nightingale Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Biography of Florence Nightingale - Essay Example status and the family would rather prefer she marry into her own upper social class as a dutiful, devoted wife and a zealous, dedicated mother to future children. However, she refused to give up her dream of becoming a nurse; she also claimed to have religious visions regarding an obligation to serve other in conformity with her reformist ideas of a woman going beyond her home and be an asset for service to humanity. She went ahead with her plans of taking up nursing despite opposition from her family because she had sincerely believed affluent young women should contribute more to society than just attend a series of afternoon tea parties as was customary at that time for wealthy English families. She had rejected several serious marriage proposals from different suitors who found her beautiful, witty, slender, and graceful. She thought marriage would seriously interfere with her plans of serving others through nursing. Florence Nightingale can be considered as one of the pioneers of the feminist movement as she rejected the traditional roles which a woman is supposed to do but instead charted her own path and destiny based on her convictions. She is generally considered as the founder of modern professional nursing as practiced today. Nursing before Florence Nightingale was not practiced professionally in the sense it had no set rules and regulations regarding how to treat patients properly for them to recover their health and wellness back soon enough; most hospitals were dirty and medical practices were likewise not very hygienic which was why many patients died in hospitals due to some infections instead of getting better. Florence Nightingale professionalized the art of nursing by implementing reforms in how nurses should conduct themselves and how to treat the patients. She found nursing to be the ideal vehicle by which to answer her calling of serving others as it is a basic service neglected by most government authorities and the medical industry. The