Florence Nightingale (1820-1910) was a British nurse who reformed sanitary conditions in hospitals. She is considered the founder of modern nursing. She is also known as “the lady with the lamp” because she would make her rounds among the patients in the evening, usually with a lamp in her hand. This name was given to her by the patients, as they were grateful for her attention to their needs, and during the Crimean War, she was even called “the angel of Crimea” for her kindness and hard work.
Florence was also a statistician and helped other army statisticians count the number of deaths and their causes, discovering that out of the 18,000 deaths, 16,000 were due to preventable diseases. What did that mean? Something needed to change in the way things were done, particularly in hospitals. She developed a chart later known as the “Nightingale Rose Diagram,” in which she showed how the work of the Sanitary Commission could help reduce the mortality rate, inspiring new hygiene standards in the army and beyond. Thanks to her remarkable work, she became the first female member of the Royal Statistical Society and was made an honorary member of the American Statistical Association.
In 1860, she founded St. Thomas’ Hospital and, within it, the Nightingale School of Nursing. She dedicated her life to research on health services, with hygiene being one of her key areas of focus. Through her tireless work, she reformed the healthcare system, influencing the quality of care in the 19th and 20th centuries.