Remember… We asked our esteemed keynote speakers, Jean Watson, Peggy Chinn, Janet Quinn, and Marcia Hills: What would you choose as the top 4 publications (articles, websites, books, whatever) about Human Caring?
We did that…
- to provide some background reading – adding to what you know, refreshing what you know, challenging what you ‘know’,
- to engage our conference presenters and attendees in the ‘subject matter’ of our conference,
- to encourage conversation – both before and at the conference, and
- simply to add to your human caring bibliography.
So, where shall we start? To borrow a phrase from a current cable news talk-show host, Let’s Get After It!
Our first offering, from Jean Watson, is a manuscript that is based on a presentation that she gave at an International Health Administration Conference in Nuremberg, Germany in November 2005. It directly addresses the HCC2019 conference subtheme of Bridging Caring and Corporate Models of Care.
Entitled, Caring Theory as an Ethical Guide to Administrative and Clinical Practices, Jean’s paper starts with the provocative sentence:
Caring and economics, and caring and administrative practices, are often considered in conflict with each other.
She goes on to explore, and critique, the dominant institutional values and commitments pointing out how they are informed and guided by economics, technology, medical science, and administrative theory, instead of basic considerations of what it means to be human, to be vulnerable, to be ill, to be cured, to be cared for, to be healthy, and to be healed.
But, says Jean, it does not need to be nor should it be that way. She states:
A values-based, theory-guided approach to caring and administration helps to make visible that a caring model for professional nursing and system survival would meet needs of practitioners and patients alike.
And that’s just where she begins! Jean’s paper presents compelling arguments, advocating for the inclusion of Human Caring theories as a guide for changing nursing practice and to address many of the current healthcare woes not the least of which is that ‘‘Nurses love their work and hate their jobs.’’
You can find Jean’s manuscript here. (Note that, due to copyright restrictions, the vast majority of the publications that we will be highlighting here are not available for free, online or otherwise. However, many of you who are connected with academic or healthcare institutions do have free online access to many of the materials (particularly academic articles such as this one) via your organization. And you can always take a trip to the library like in the good old days!)
Do the points that Jean makes resonate with you? Do you see a shift happening away from the current ‘dominant institutional values and commitments’? Should there be?
Let’s get after it!
