International Nurses Day is celebrated around the world on May 12, the anniversary of the birth of Florence Nightingale, considered the pioneer of modern nursing. In 2022, the theme of the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) campaign is: “No nurses = no care”, which reflects the need to invest in training, employment, leadership and practice. of nursing”. [1]
The theme reinforces the actions carried out in 2021, designated by the World Health Organization (WHO) as the International Year of Health Professionals and Caregivers – in recognition of the performance of these professionals in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic, in the same year in which the International Council of Nursing focuses on the future of nursing and how these professionals will transform the vision of health care. [2].
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the policies and the future of political and technical discussions around the training of human resources for health and reinforced the universal need to protect and invest in all professions that participate in the preparedness and response capacity in public health functions, in particular nurses.
Nursing professionals are at the forefront of service delivery and play an important role in caring for people and communities. In many countries, they serve as leaders or key members of multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary health teams, providing a wide range of services at all levels of the health system.
However, there is a shortage of nursing professionals in the Region of the Americas; this shortage is mainly attributable to the emigration of professionals to other regions, different levels of economic development in countries, precarious employment conditions, human resources policies for health workers, including nurses, and lack of professional regulations. [3]
In 2021, WHO published The WHO Global Strategic Directions for Nursing and Midwifery (2021–2025) document, covering four areas of policy interest: education, jobs, leadership, and provision of services. Its recommendations include: 1) training nursing and midwifery professionals in sufficient numbers to meet the population’s health needs; 2) create jobs, manage migration and recruit and retain these employees where they are most needed; 3) strengthen nursing and midwifery leadership in health systems and academia; and 4) ensure that these professionals are supported, respected, protected, motivated, and equipped to contribute safely and optimally to their service delivery environments. [4]
To provide scientific and technical information to health professionals, researchers and the general public on nursing, BIREME/PAHO/WHO developed, in partnership with the School of Nursing of the Federal University of Minas Gerais and with the collaboration of a network of producing institutions of scientific and technical information in the area of Nursing, the Nursing Virtual Health Library International (Nursing VHL) available in Portuguese and Spanish.
The Nursing VHL aims to select, organize, and disseminate the best scientific production in the area, to facilitate the access of professionals, students, and decision makers in nursing to the best scientific evidence. All content available in the VHL is selected according to pre-established selection criteria and the journals are perennially evaluated by the International Committee for the Evaluation of Periodicals of the Nursing VHL and approved by the Advisory Committee of the International Nursing VHL.
The VHL portal uses the information management methodologies and technologies developed by BIREME, and its collaboration network is continuously expanded, with the participation of institutions from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Mexico, Portugal and Uruguay.
References
[1] Pan American Health Organization. International Nurses Day 2022. https://www.observatoriorh.org/en/international-nurses-day-2022
[2] World Health Organization. Year of the Health and Care Workers 2021. https://www.who.int/campaigns/annual-theme/year-of-health-and-care-workers-2021#
[3] Pan American Health Organization. Topics in Health. Nursing. https://www.paho.org/en/topics/nursing
[4] Pan American Health Organization. International Nurses Day 2022. https://www.paho.org/en/campaigns/international-nurses-day-12-may-2022