Pride or prejudice – issues in the history of children’s nurse education

Abstract

The history of the education of nurses to care for sick children is notable on two counts. First, that the advent of training for nurses in the care of children pre-dates that of nurses caring for adults. Second, that it is a history fraught with prejudice, threats and misapprehensions. Certain key issues recur throughout the 130 years that education of children’s nurses has existed: most are as familiar to professionals in this arena today as they were at the turn of the 19th century. Central to these issues is the status of children’s nurses within the profession. Often deemed second rate citizens in nursing spheres, relegated to a supplementary register in 1919, their skills and knowledge under-valued, the specialist needs of children’s nurses have often gone unrecognised. Efforts to convince general adult nurses of the equity of their value and, in the light of the differences between children and adults, the importance of specialist pre-registration education, has at times been difficult to achieve. These factors have impacted upon, and been reflected in, the progress of education for children’s nurses. It is these issues that this paper seeks to illuminate and explore, through an examination of the history and development of children’s nurse education.