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Little science
Applied Nursing Research Vol. 4, No. 4
November 1991
EDITORIAL
Little Science NE OF MY medical colleagues recently characterized nursing research as "little science." By that he meant that scientific breakthroughs in nursing were not revolutionary within the larger scientific community. In fact, in explaining and justifying his label he said, " y o u know, you folks don't study really important questions." Scientific advances in the last half of this century have led us to conclude that medical sciences, physics, nuclear medicine, and biomedical engineering, for example, are revolutionary sciences. Scientists from these disciplines have advanced our country's space program and contributed much to the cure and treatment of many life-threatening and debilitating diseases. Ours is a better world because of these researchers and their scientific contributions. Ask any patient suffering from terminal cancer. Ask an HIV-infected individual. Ask a woman with multiple sclerosis. They would tell you that they are hopeful that biomedical researchers will discover the breakthrough leading to a cure for their presently treatable, yet incurable, disease. We all continue to believe that the world would be a better place if we could eradicate disease, pain, and suffering, particularly our own. Ask an elderly person who has been " c u r e d " of incontinence about her current life and her ability to go out of the house without embarrassment. Ask a child who has been " c u r e d " of his fears of sur-
gery, after repeated surgeries for repair of a birth defect. Ask a new mother who avoided a Caesarean birth for breech presentation through exercises to change the baby's presentation. Surely, these advances in nursing research can be characterized as scientific breakthroughs, though perhaps "little" breakthroughs. But for those who are assisted; those whose quality of life is changed and enhanced; those who are one step closer to leading a normal life; those whose pain is reduced, yet not obliterated; those who are helped to walk, to.talk, to play, to sing again; those for whom our nursing science has made a difference in the quality of life--nursing science is not "little." In our search for perfection, it is often easy to lose sight of our humanity. We all want to rise above our own mortality, to conquer pain and suffering, and to idealize the human experience. And yet, could we not characterize the real breakthroughs as those focused on improvements in the quality of our lives. Perhaps our world of the future can be one in which nurse and physician researchers collaborate to address health care problems of significant interest because they have the potential to improve the quality of our human experience, in health and illness. Isn't this really " b i g " science?
Applied Nursing Research, Vol. 4, No. 4 (November), 1991: p. 151
151
O
Joyce J. Fitzpatrick Editor
November 1991
EDITORIAL
Little Science NE OF MY medical colleagues recently characterized nursing research as "little science." By that he meant that scientific breakthroughs in nursing were not revolutionary within the larger scientific community. In fact, in explaining and justifying his label he said, " y o u know, you folks don't study really important questions." Scientific advances in the last half of this century have led us to conclude that medical sciences, physics, nuclear medicine, and biomedical engineering, for example, are revolutionary sciences. Scientists from these disciplines have advanced our country's space program and contributed much to the cure and treatment of many life-threatening and debilitating diseases. Ours is a better world because of these researchers and their scientific contributions. Ask any patient suffering from terminal cancer. Ask an HIV-infected individual. Ask a woman with multiple sclerosis. They would tell you that they are hopeful that biomedical researchers will discover the breakthrough leading to a cure for their presently treatable, yet incurable, disease. We all continue to believe that the world would be a better place if we could eradicate disease, pain, and suffering, particularly our own. Ask an elderly person who has been " c u r e d " of incontinence about her current life and her ability to go out of the house without embarrassment. Ask a child who has been " c u r e d " of his fears of sur-
gery, after repeated surgeries for repair of a birth defect. Ask a new mother who avoided a Caesarean birth for breech presentation through exercises to change the baby's presentation. Surely, these advances in nursing research can be characterized as scientific breakthroughs, though perhaps "little" breakthroughs. But for those who are assisted; those whose quality of life is changed and enhanced; those who are one step closer to leading a normal life; those whose pain is reduced, yet not obliterated; those who are helped to walk, to.talk, to play, to sing again; those for whom our nursing science has made a difference in the quality of life--nursing science is not "little." In our search for perfection, it is often easy to lose sight of our humanity. We all want to rise above our own mortality, to conquer pain and suffering, and to idealize the human experience. And yet, could we not characterize the real breakthroughs as those focused on improvements in the quality of our lives. Perhaps our world of the future can be one in which nurse and physician researchers collaborate to address health care problems of significant interest because they have the potential to improve the quality of our human experience, in health and illness. Isn't this really " b i g " science?
Applied Nursing Research, Vol. 4, No. 4 (November), 1991: p. 151
151
O
Joyce J. Fitzpatrick Editor