May 6 through 12 each year is National Nurses Week. It is a time to recognize nurses’ immensurable gifts to society. Nurses Week is a time to show appreciation and to acknowledge nurses for all they do.
May 6 is National Nurses Day, and May 12 is the birthday of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing.
The recorded effort to create time set aside to honor nurses was a combined one that was drawn out over the expanse of 40 years.
The campaign to establish time set aside to recognize nurses began in 1953 by Dorothy Sutherland of the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. She proposed a Nurse Day to the White House.
A week in October 1954 was selected as National Nurses Week to denote the 100-year anniversary of Florence Nightingale’s mission to help troops in the Crimean War.
It wasn’t until January of 1974 when International Nurse Day was pronounced by the International Council of Nurses, that May 12 was to be set aside as a day of recognition. A week was set aside in the United States for this recognition.
Nurses are now honored throughout the entire month of May for National Nurses Month due to the efforts of the ANA, American Nurses Association, and pioneers of the past.—Source nursejournal.org