por Ernestine Wiedenbach (1900-1998) was in charge of developing the theory and philosophy on which nursing was based. Within this area of medicine she specialized in midwifery. During her professional career she also served as an author and teacher. She even came to develop her nursing theories while she was teaching at Yale.
His work was recognized worldwide after publishing his first book. It was a text that dealt with nursing in the area of maternity, whose objective was to delve into the care that should be provided and its focus on the family.
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Biography
Early academic years
Ernestine Wiedenbach was born into a wealthy family on August 18, 1900, in Hamburg, Germany. Her interest in nursing began when she was forced to care for her sick grandmother.
This new passion grew thanks to the fact that Wiedenbach’s sister had a friend who was a medical student and whose stories on the subject fascinated the German.
Despite this passion for science, Wiedenbach first earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts from Wellesley College in the United States. Later, in 1922, he entered nursing school, although he did so without the support of his family.
Wiedenbach was expelled from the first academic institution she attended for echoing the complaints of a group of students. This was not an impediment for her later she could enter the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. Her permanence was always conditional, since she could not participate in any student demonstration.
work stage
He graduated from the Johns Hopkins in 1925 and was offered a position as supervisor. A position she held until she moved to Bellevue.
He never abandoned his education. He took night classes at Columbia University and completed a master’s degree, as well as receiving a nursing certificate in public health. All this for the year 1934. He even practiced public medicine by working with organizations that sought to improve the conditions of those most in need.
During a stage of his Wiedenbach career he even wrote for newspapers. After the attack on Pearl Harbor he took a more active role and was in charge of preparing the nurses who acted during World War II.
At the age of 45, she continued studying and enrolled, on the recommendation of Hazel Corbin, at the School for Midwives. When she obtained her degree, she worked as a midwife and she came to declare that what she liked the most was attending births at home. She also taught classes at night.
In 1952 she became the director of the neonatal graduate programs in Yale’s nursing area. She was instrumental in getting the university to add a graduate program in midwifery.
He retired in 1966 and never married. He died when she was 97 years old, on March 8, 1998.
Theory
Wiedenbach developed his nursing theory at the end of the 50s and beginning of the 60s. The central idea of the proposal was based on knowing how nurses could help patients. In this model, nursing care was discussed for the first time and it gave guidelines on what the process was like.
Helping was Wiedenbach’s main concern in his proposal and nursing had to revolve around that concept.
The German defined nursing help as those tasks that allowed other people to overcome any problem that could affect their normal functioning. That is, the goal of nursing was to provide comfort.
In his studies, Wiedenbach discussed the different types of help that could be given to a patient during their care. In addition, the role of nurses was vital to achieving successful medical care.
The theory of nursing that Wiedenbach proposed delved into several novel concepts in the area. He defined the main actors as patients and nurses. Both had very active roles in the care process.
Patients did not always refer to sick people, since the recipient of the help could also be any individual whose objective was to educate themselves on a health topic.
Wiedenbach also spoke in his theory about other concepts such as the need for help, knowledge, validation, the perception of people. Likewise, he gave great importance to feelings and thoughts, since he explained that they were the tools of a nurse to define the care needs that a patient had.
Wiedenbach’s theory evolved over time and was fed by practice and the study of new medical cases.
Statements
Wiedenbach stated in his theory that the help provided thanks to nursing consisted of several factors: the need to receive assistance, the approval of being helped and the service provided.
The validation of the help, for example, would allow the effectiveness of the work carried out by the nurses to be greater.
In this proposal it was vital to discern between facts and assumptions. In this sense, the role of nurses was decisive since they needed to decipher when help was necessary.
The necessary skills for nursing, according to the theory, spoke of a perfect synchronization between the movements, the precision when adopting measures and the effective use of them.
critics
For some, Weidenbach’s theory did not have enough links between the concepts he developed. The main criticism focused on the fact that there were inconsistencies and that there was a lack of clarity in some of the terms presented.
An argument made by the detractors of Weidenbach’s theory stated that the impact of the proposal was very limited in scope. The patient had to want to participate in her care, understand the need to receive or ask for help, and be aware of the environment and context.
In spite of everything, Weidenbach’s effort to detail and determine the philosophical premises on which he based his thoughts was recognized.
Influence
Weidenbach was a professor of nursing at Yale, specifically in the area of maternity, during the years that she was working on her theory. She benefited greatly from the ideas of Patricia James and James Dickoff. Both were philosophers who gave philosophy classes to nurses.
That is why Weidenbach’s theory has a very marked holistic approach. Vision that also defined the care guidelines that nursing should provide.
The contribution of the nurse Ida Orlando was also decisive in Weidenbach’s theory. Orlando talked about the relationship between patient and nurse.
Other Contributions
Ernestine Wiedenbach was the author of several books and articles that were published during her career. In 1958 she wrote one of her most important works, Family-centered maternity nursing. In 1964 he wrote Clinical Nursing: A Helping Art.
References
George, J. (1995). Nursing theories. Appleton & Lange.
Meleis, A. Theoretical nursing (4th ed.). Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
Reed, P., & Shearer, N. (2012). Perspectives on nursing theory. Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
Sitzman, K., & Eichelberger, L. (2011). Understanding the work of nurse theorists (2nd ed.). Massachusetts: Jones and Bartlett Publishers.
Snowden, A., Donnell, A., & Duffy, T. (2014). Pioneering Theories in Nursing. Luton: Andrews UK.