Nurses in War: Voices from Iraq and Afghanistan - Softcover

Elizabeth Scannell-Desch; Mary Ellen Doherty

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0826193838 ISBN 13: 9780826193834

Publisher: Springer Publishing Company, 2012

Synopsis

This is no doubt the most significant work on military nursing recorded since Florence Nightingale wrote her Notes on Nursing. You definitely want to have this book for your private bookshelf."--Society of Air Force Nurses (SAFN) Newsletter

"This book speaks to the strength, skill, professionalism, and determination of US military nurses, clearly identifying them as unsung heroes of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars....Recommended."--Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries

Nurses in War embodies the core values of each of the military services and is a personal testament to the integrity, excellence, selflessness, devotion to duty, courage, and commitment that exemplifies military nursing...This book should be in every nurse's personal library. It has a well-deserved place of honor in my own nursing literature collection."

Brigadier General Linda J. Stierle (Retired)
United States Air Force

Thank you to Beth Scannell-Desch and Mary Ellen Doherty for documenting this critical period of nursing history. It is a true classic, deserving a prominent place in your library.

Lucille A. Joel, RN, EdD, FAAN
Professor, Rutgers College of Nursing
Former President, American Nurses Association
Former First Vice-President, International Council of Nurses (ICN)

Powerful, poignant, riveting account of nurses in war...This book captures the palpable essence of what it is like to live and work in Iraq and Afghanistan as a military nurse during the current wars. Based on three research studies, this book reads like a novel. The reader gets up close to these 37 nurses as they care for casualties in combat support hospitals, on medevac aircraft, and on forward surgical teams. You can feel the tension as mortars fall in hospital compounds. You can hear the sound of helicopters ferrying patients. You can feel the adrenaline rush as nurses respond to mass casualties in the emergency room or triage area as they fight to save the lives of soldiers, local villagers, and children caught in the chaos of war. This book is a must-read."

Wendy C. Budin, PhD, RN-BC, FACCE, FAAN
Director of Nursing Research at NYU Langone Medical Center, NY
Adjunct Professor, NYU College of Nursing
President-Elect, Eastern Nursing Research Society
Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Perinatal Education

This unique volume presents the experience of 37 U.S. military nurses sent to the Iraq and Afghanistan theaters of war to care for the injured and dying. The personal and professional challenges they faced, the difficulties they endured, the dangers they overcame, and the consequences they grappled with are vividly described from deployment to discharge. In mobile surgical field hospitals and fast-forward teams, detainee care centers, base and city hospitals, medevac aircraft, and aeromedical staging units, these nurses cared for their patients with compassion, acumen, and inventiveness. And when they returned home, they dealt with their experience as they could.

The text is divided into thematic chapters on essential issues: how the nurses separated from their families and the uncertainties they faced in doing so; their response to horrific injuries that combatants, civilians and children suffered; working and living in Iraq and Afghanistan for extended periods; personal health issues; and what it meant to care for enemy insurgents and detainees. Also discussed is how the experience enhanced their clinical skills, why their adjustment to civilian life was so difficult, and how the war changed them as nurses, citizens, and people.

Key Features:

• Describes verbatim the experiences of 37 nurses in two brutal, chaotic theaters of war
• Offers poignant encounters with patients
• Includes advice, clarity, and lessons learned about nursing in war
• Offers a women's health perspective on working and living in a war zone
• Demonstrates the dedication, expertise, and spirit of military nurses

About this title

From the Back Cover

87

About the Author

Elizabeth Scannell-Desch, PhD, RN, OCNS is Associate Dean for Undergraduate Studies and a professor at Rutgers University, School of Nursing Camden, New Jersey. Her research focuses on women’s health and military nursing. She is a retired Colonel in the US Air Force Nurse Corps, having served 25 years on active duty, including eight years overseas. Her last military assignment was at the Pentagon as the Chief Nurse Executive for the entire Air Force Reserve. She was also Chairperson of the Nursing Division at Mount Saint Mary College, Coordinator for Graduate and Undergraduate Studies at Adelphi University, College of Nursing, Hudson Valley Center, NY, and a faculty member at Rutgers University, College of Nursing, Newark and New Brunswick, New Jersey. Dr. Scannell-Desch has many data-based publications in national and international peer-reviewed nursing journals, including The Western Journal of Nursing Research, The Journal of Nursing Scholarship, The Journal of Psychosocial Nursing, MCN: The American Journal of Maternal-Child Nursing, The Journal of Transcultural Nursing, and The Journal of Advanced Nursing. Much of her published research has focused on nurses serving in the Vietnam War, and the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. Dr. Scannell-Desch served as visiting faculty in the summer of 2001 at the University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Cluj-Napoka, Romania, and as military consultant to the Surgeon General for Nursing Research and for Oncology Nursing. She received the Rita C. Kopf Memorial Research Award from the Foundation of New York State Nurses in 2010 and the Sustained Professional Performance Award from the Foundation of New York State Nurses in 2012. Dr. Scannell-Desch is a reviewer for Military Medicine, and has presented her research nationally and internationally.

Mary Ellen Doherty, PhD, CNM, RN, is Professor, Western Connecticut State University, Danbury, CT. She teaches nursing students at the Undergraduate, Masters, and Doctorate levels. Dr. Doherty is also an active researcher specializing in women’s health and midwifery, although her most recent work focuses on nurses’ experiences in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and their reintegration. She has been a Certified Nurse-Midwife for over 30 years, working in both the public and private sectors. Dr. Doherty was the Founder and President of Concord Nurse-Midwifery Associates, a private midwifery practice with delivery privileges at Emerson Hospital in Concord, MA. Her research articles have been published in The Journal of Midwifery and Women’s Health, The Journal of Nursing Scholarship, The Journal of Perinatal Education, The International Journal of Childbirth Education, MCN: The American Journal of Maternal-Child Nursing, and The Journal of Psychosocial Nursing. She is an active member of the American College of Nurse-Midwives, three chapters of Sigma Theta Tau, the Association of Women’s Health, Obstetric, and Neonatal Nurses (AWHONN), Lamaze INC, and the International Childbirth Education Association. In 2013, Dr. Doherty received the Norton Mezvinsky Award for Excellence in Research from the Connecticut State University System, Board of Regents. This was the first time the award was given to a nurse. Dr. Doherty is a reviewer for two maternal-child nursing journals and is an expert witness on maternal-newborn cases for the legal system. She has presented her research throughout the United States and in Ireland, England, Austria, and Denmark.

Edition details

• Publisher: Springer Publishing Company
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0826193838
• ISBN 13: 9780826193834
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 296