Nursing is a science and an art, combining evidence-based practice with a practice based on caring, compassion, kindness, and respect. Evidence-based practice legitimizes nursing as a profession, as it eliminates guesswork during the delivery of care and ensuring a scientific foundation for clinical decisions. Nursing involves following and often developing the standards and procedures that promote both individual health and public health. As an art, however, nursing involves caring for patients, families, and communities. The ontological root of nursing is the act and process of promoting health and well-being. Nursing is a relational profession, highlighting the nurse's role within the health care system. Nursing is frequently defined as both "art" and "science," (Potter, Perry, Stockert & Hall, 2013; Mississippi Delta Community College, n.d.). The art component of nursing is best expressed in the subtle nuances of the delivery of care, including attitudes and behaviors toward patients. As an art, nursing entails a broad vision of health, health care, and healing. As a science, nursing includes a compendium of knowledge including scholarly literature that informs judicious practice. Nursing is also a multidisciplinary science, which draws from a number of different realms of study both within and outside of the medical professions. Combining art and science, nursing is a dynamic and complex process.

The American Nurses' Association (2013) defines nursing as "the protection, promotion, and optimization of health and abilities, prevention of illness and injury, alleviation of suffering through the diagnosis and treatment of human response, and advocacy in the care of individuals, families, communities, and populations." This definition can be enhanced by a conceptualization of the nurse as a public health promoter, a role best achieved via involvement in education, policy, and health care administration. Defining nursing with clarity has "coincided with the emergence of unprecedented change in the management of health care," which is why redefining nursing remains an essential part of the evolution of the practice (McMahon, Pearson & Pearson, 1998, p. vii).

No definition of nursing would be complete without including...

Regardless of the specific role that is fulfilled by the nurse, these three primary qualities of compassion, caring, and respect remain salient. Nurses working in a variety of professional contexts exhibit compassion, caring, and respect for the end-users of the health care system including patients, family members, and the community as an aggregate entity. The patient is and remains the "center" of the nursing practice even when the nurse no longer works directly with patients on a daily basis (Potter, Perry, Stockert & Hall, 2013, p. 1). Moreover, nurses care and respect for their colleagues and the profession as a whole. This is why a nurse is still a nurse when he or she works in nurse education or policy development. Nursing is as much about transforming and improving the health care system as it is about providing bedside care or performing medical procedures.
The emergence of evidence-based practice has transformed the nature of the nursing profession and continues to do so. Evidence-based practice has legitimized the nursing profession, by making sure nurses follow protocols that are rooted in empirical research. Most nurses will engage in research design of their own to promote the ideals of the profession and discover new methods of helping patients. Nursing involves a high degree of both critical thinking and creative thinking, especially when applying evidence to practice. Applying evidence to practice entails analyzing a large corpus of knowledge and adapting that knowledge to individual patient situations. Interpreting scientific knowledge is only part of the inputs into critical thought that define the role of the nurse; in addition to scientific knowledge, the nurse must also trust the wisdom that comes from clinical experience.

Nursing has been a gendered profession since its inception. During the Crimean War, Florence Nightingale and other females provided nursing care to wounded soldiers. Nursing remains a profession that is dominated by women, and has often been a "subservient role under the patriarchal system," (Chinn & Wheeler, 1985, p. 74). Wresting itself from a…