History of American Nursing: Trends and Eras is the first comprehensive nursing history text to be published in years. It provides a historical overview essential to developing a complete understanding of the nursing profession. For each key era of U.S. history, nursing is examined in the contexts of the sociopolitical climate of the day, the image of nurses, nursing education, advances in practice, war and its effect on nursing, licensure and regulation, and nursing research and its implications. From early nursing to Nightingale's revolutionizing influence, through two world wars to today, this succinct text engages students in an exploration of nursing's past while connecting it to nursing practice in the present. A History of American Nursing: Trends and Eras is designed to inform and empower today's student nurses as they help to create the future of nursing.