National Nurses Week: Celebrating the unwavering trust, adaptability, and human connection in nursing
Nurses Week is typically a time of year when I reflect on the profession and what keeps nursing grounded, even as everything around it continues to change. It’s also a moment to step back and recognize something that has remained remarkably consistent over time: that nursing continues to be ranked as the most trusted profession. That doesn’t happen by chance. It’s an acknowledgment of the contributions nurses make every day — and which often get overlooked.
It’s also the reason I counsel young people to choose nursing as a career when they may be undecided or evaluating their options. When I’m asked whether nursing is a career to pursue, my answer always remains the same: YES! I tell them I have done more things as a nurse than I ever dreamed I would when I pursued this profession. Even now, as the profession has become more complex and the experience looks very different from when I started, what has stayed the same is the human connection — being there with individuals at their most vulnerable moments. That’s what continues to inspire me and give meaning to my work.
What I always come back to when I answer that question is the versatility of the profession. You are never just one type of nurse, and that has always been true. Nurses are everywhere across the care continuum, which opens possibilities that don’t exist in the same way in other roles. For instance, you can be at the bedside, or you can move into leadership or information technology or quality or public health or even areas that people don’t always associate with nursing at first. But our nursing education teaches us to take a holistic view, and we can apply that strong and broad skill set to any kind of role, not just the one at the bedside.
The evolving complexity of delivering patient care
It would be unrealistic to ignore what nurses are dealing with right now or the challenges nurse leaders face in keeping teams motivated and engaged. There are ongoing staffing shortages, financial pressures that feel more immediate than they used to, and a steady stream of new technologies that are being introduced into use in care delivery — often without training or governance. At the same time, care delivery is becoming more complex, shifting beyond traditional acute care and inpatient settings with more procedures and services moving to outpatient clinics, ambulatory surgery centers, and home-based care.
What has stayed consistent, though, is nurses’ commitment to the quality of patient care. That does not change, no matter what the surrounding conditions look like. Whether navigating extraordinary challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic or facing what feels like never-ending shifts in the healthcare landscape, nurses maintain commitment to providing the highest levels of care — and they always remind everyone to keep the patient at the center of all care decisions. That is the constant I see, and it is the reason none of the pressures seem to change the core of what the profession represents.
That commitment is evident in Wolters Kluwer’s recent survey data. In the Lippincott® FutureCare Nursing survey, nurse leaders respond that they are continuing to move forward with new care models despite the barriers. Even in today’s constrained and uncertain environment, nurse leaders are not stepping back from innovation. They are continuing to test, adapt, and implement changes that support nurses and optimize patient care.
There is a similar dynamic when it comes to generative AI and other emerging technologies. Nurses are among the most open to trying these tools, and they express clear optimism about what the tools can do. At the same time, they express the very practical expectation that organizations must have the right structures in place before the tools can become fully integrated into clinical care workflows. In the Wolters Kluwer Future Ready Healthcare survey, most nurses say generative AI will be important to productivity, but fewer say they feel fully prepared to use it. That gap reflects needs for governance, training, and clarity, not a lack of willingness to use AI.
Why human connection remains at the core of patient care
All of this points to something that is easy to overlook if one focuses only on the challenges: Nurses are adapting to everything that is changing around them, but they are doing so in a way that protects what matters most — the patient. The patient remains at the center of every care decision, and that principle has not shifted. It is the primary reason the profession continues to be the most trusted.
For me, that is what National Nurses Week represents. It is not only about recognition — which is well deserved — but it is a reminder of what has stayed true, even as the profession continues to evolve. The environment may feel uncertain at times, and the challenges are real, but the core of nursing has not wavered.
So, when I’m sharing a coffee with an aspiring nurse, I tell them exactly what they’re walking into. I talk about the pressures and the fast pace and the demanding realities of the work. But I also explain what makes nursing a profession worth pursuing. I explain the power of professional nursing to society, communities, families, and individuals as well as the impact nurses have every day and in ways no other profession does.
Find out more about how Lippincott® Solutions can help nurse leaders translate innovation into sustainable care delivery — with evidence-based guidance, technology-enabled support, and practical tools designed to strengthen care models at scale.
