Nightingale Declaration for A Healthy World Starts with ME as a

An opportunity to participate in the Nightingale Initiative for Global Health (NIGH) outreach to individuals worldwide starts with me, us, and the WOCN / WCET organizations.  Take the pledge to dedicate as wound, ostomy, continence, and foot care nurses to share knowledge, resources, and compassion for those less fortunate.  We, as a specialty, are the first group of nurses sought after in times of disaster.  Injuries, amputations, and abdominal insults in time of disaster result in wounds, amputations, pressure ulcers, and ostomies. 

One example and opportunity was “ An International Foot and Wound Care Training Initiative in Honduras” which takes on a whole new meaning for nurses in a poverty stricken country.  Nurses can sit for WOCNCB board certification in their country, in their language.  What an exciting opportunity for implementing the NIGH (Nightingale Initiative for Global Health).  From 2008-2012 education, both didactic  and hands on clinical experience, have been conducted in San Pedro Sula, Honduras in the aim to elevate the practice of foot care / wound care.  Seven nurses have completed the required training to sit for board certification, the first ever in Honduras, a 3^rd World Country in Central America.  These nurses have taken the pledge, by the sheer fact of their social, economic, and health care situation to dedicate themselves to the belief that Florence Nightingale expressed repeatedly that , “Every one everywhere deserves to be well and heal.”

"We, the nurses and concerned citizens of the global community, hereby dedicate ourselves to the accomplishment of a healthy world by the year 2020.” Do something to unite and promote global world.  Get involved with the WCET Congress and WOCN organization and learn firsthand what can and needs to be done. 

Go to www.dosseydossey.com/barbara/nigh/html to sign the Nightingale Declaration; www.NIGHCommunities.org