Health of the population is the most valuable achievement of the society, therefore, its preservation and strengthening is an important task, in which all must participate, without exception.
Not the last role in accomplishing this task is assigned to our numerous, hard-working and, I think, the main link of health care – to nurses. For many years, the prestige of the work of the nurse, her social status has been decreasing, active and purposeful work is currently underway to revive the nursing profession, its importance.
The reasons for the lagging of nursing in comparison with the developed countries, in my opinion, are diverse: the traditional idea in our country of a nurse as an assistant doctor who performs only auxiliary medical functions; Neglect of foreign experience, underestimation of scientific principles and approaches to the management and organization of nurses’ work, their professional training. However, changes in the conditions for the functioning of state structures, the severity of the economic situation in the country, the ongoing transition to market relations, put forward new approaches to the organization and methodological support of training, retraining and advanced training of industry specialists, their practical use.
Often, it is the nurses who are close to the patient in the first minutes of deterioration of his condition in a hospital, at home with active calls, provide first-aid, psychological support to patients and their relatives. To whom during the night duty in the hospital first the patient run, who on several occasions per shift communicates with the patient, knows about all his movements and changes in the state of the day? Of course it’s a nurse! There are no “average” medical workers; there are nurses with secondary medical education.
Of course, changes in the economic and political activities of our state have significantly affected health care. There are new forms of interaction between the population and its serving medical personnel. The rigid financial framework for providing workers in the budgetary sphere gave birth to market relations in medicine. There was a paid service. The rendered medical aid acts as a commodity, but only high-quality goods are in demand. The need for high professionalism of medical workers, especially nurses, entailed a change in the initial training. At present, there is a multi-level system: basic (medical schools), advanced (colleges) and the highest level (faculties of higher nursing education of medical schools).