Afaf Meleis

• University of Pennsylvania

With the many economic, demographic, social and epidemiological global transitions, a Harvard-Penn-Lancet commission reviewed the current health status of women and its relationship to sustainability, and redefined the field as women and health. Four major recommendations were offered, insuring mechanisms to count women properly as providers and re...

Purpose: Effective, quality care to achieve the newly developed sustainable development goals requires the development of collaborative teams and is predicated on implementing transformative interprofessional education and on team members who are equally empowered. This is a report on The Lancet commission on transformative education for health pr...

Stepping up from leadership is a protracted transition that involves a complex set of interactions with many constituents. It begins with making the personal decision to step up to integrating the role of the dean in existing repertoire of roles that the person enacts. Deliberate planning, awareness of phases, challenges, goals and strategies, clea...

The author develops in this editorial a claiming discourse whose purpose is to draw attention to the nurses to make their voices heard at a particularly propitious time for it (the stars are aligned). Afaf Meleis describes the current situation as the ideal for the nursing profession, finally, exercise your voice and contribute to optimizer health...

Next week, the UN General Assembly will call on member states to bid farewell to the Millennium Dewvelopment Goals andadopt 17 new Sustainable Development Goals.

More than 20 years ago, the American Association of the Colleges of Nursing (AACN) released a position statement endorsing academic-practice partnerships.1 Since then, many leading nursing organizations including the National League for Nursing2 and the American Organization of Nurse Executives (AONE)3 have echoed the sentiments put forth by the AA...

Since 2009, a mysterious neurologic condition has afflicted thousands of northern Ugandan school children. This fatal disorder-known as nodding disease-leaves its victims stunted, mentally incapacitated, and often severely scarred or burned due to unexpected falls from epileptic-like seizures.(1,2) The syndrome is characterized initially by cogniti...

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the number one killer of women worldwide, and it remains the primary cause of death and disability in both developed and developing countries. The International Council on Women's Health Issues is an international nonprofit association dedicated to the goals of promoting the health, health care, and the well-being of...

The International Council on Women's Health Issues (ICOWHI) is an international nonprofit association dedicated to the goal of promoting health, health care, and well-being of women and girls throughout the world through participation, empowerment, advocacy, education, and research. We are a multidisciplinary network of women's health providers, pl...

Hace 100 años, diversos estudios sobre la educación de los profesionales de la salud dieron lugar a reformas innovadoras. Los nuevos retos del siglo xxiobligan a rediseñar nuevamente la educación profesional en salud. La Comisión sobre la Educación de los Profesionales de la Salud para el Siglo xxi se reunió para desarrollar una visión compartida y...

In 2004, the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) adopted a position statement concerning the future of advanced practice nursing education. A target date of 2015 was articulated as the point by which master's preparation for advanced practice nurses would be replaced by doctoral level education. Seismic shifts in the realities surrou...

Growing urbanization affects women and men in fundamentally different ways, but the relationship between gender and city environments has been ignored or misunderstood. Women and men play different roles, frequent different public areas, and face different health risks. Women suffer disproportionately from disease, injury, and violence because thei...

100 years ago, a series of studies about the education of health professionals sparked groundbreaking reforms. The challenges of the 21st century demand a new redesign of professional health education. The Commission on Education of Health Professionals for the 21st Century came together to develop a shared vision and a common strategy for postseco...

Grief is a normal response after pregnancy loss. Potentially, prolonged periods of grief can have a negative impact on physical or mental health. African-American women experience pregnancy loss at rates that are at least twice the rate of any other racial or ethnic group. However, the research literature on pregnancy loss has failed to include rep...

Most researchers studying sex work have focused on the risks of sexually transmitted diseases, predominantly HIV, for sex workers, their clients, and subsequent partners. Violence against these women often goes undocumented and unnoticed. Consequently, few researchers have addressed violence against sex workers, and these few have generated limited...

Transition is a concept of interest to nurse researchers, clinicians, and theorists. This article builds on earlier theoretical work on transitions by providing evidence from the nursing literature. A review and synthesis of the nursing literature (1986–1992) supports the claim of the centrality of transitions in nursing. Universal properties of tr...

The report of the International Conference on Population and Development (Cairo Action Document) was sponsored by 180 national governments and 1,200 nongovernmental organizations during the United Nations' conference on women, population, and development in Cairo, Egypt 1994. Many international conferences preceded the one in Cairo but it was there...

Predicting and shaping the human capacity resources for health care globally for the future requires voice and valuation of, and about, caring.

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) or not? The answer is not! Within the historical context of our discipline, a doctorate degree should stand for advancing and translating knowledge. Clinical practice is the core of this knowledge. Separating the practice and research missions could undermine our ability to be equal partners in universities, as well...

A debate is currently raging in many academic nursing circles about a new degree, the Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP). The degree is envisioned as the terminal degree in the discipline that focuses on clinical practice, and it is proposed to supplant the master's degree by 2015. There are a number of driving forces fueling the proposed change, inc...

The world continues to be unsafe for girls and women. Although natural disasters and man-made disasters make the world unsafe for all people, the gender divide further compromises safety of women. In addition to being at higher risk for violence, rape, trafficking, and abuse, women's injury and mortality increase because of the limited definition o...

Asian American immigrant women engaged in filial caregiving are at special risk for health problems due to complex contextual factors related to immigration, cultural traditions, and role transition. This study examines the experience of two groups of immigrant Asian American women who are caring for older parents. A total of 41 women (22 Chinese A...

The events of September 11th, 2001 in the United States and the Bali bombings of October 2002 are chastening examples of the entangled web of the religious, political, health, cultural and economic forces we experience living in a global community. To view these forces as independent, singular, linearly deterministic entities of globalisation is ir...

Egyptian women are increasingly becoming a significant work force; however, many of these women continue to occupy low-income jobs. In the study reported here, 190 women in Egypt employed in clerical jobs were asked about the satisfaction and stress they experience in their work and maternal roles. They were also asked about their coping approaches...

To present the coping strategies used by African American women following their miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies, fetal deaths, and still-births, which the authors have termed involuntary pregnancy losses or IPLs. Semistructured audiotaped interviews; grounded theory methods used to collect and analyze the data. Urban community-based sites in the...

Gender equity and equality in health and human development are key national and international goals. To achieve these goals, the androcentric definition of work needs to be addressed. The current definition is driven by the globalized capitalistic model, which equates "work" with generating income or the production of goods. Indeed, employment in t...

In 1995, more than half of elderly immigrants to the United States were born in Asia or the Pacific region. The purpose of this study was to describe the process of caring for elderly parents by Asian American women. Forty-one women (22 Chinese American and 19 Filipino American) caring for elderly parents were interviewed in a study based on Straus...

There is a paucity of models that drive integrated research agendas, and coherent approaches to development and progress of knowledge about women's health. In this article, we review four major models of women's health, present conditions supporting more integrative and coherent models of women's health based on the recommendations by two internati...

Purpose: To propose gender-sensitive theories as a future direction for theoretical development of women's health. Few theories pertain to women's health and illness experiences, with gender issues embedded in social, cultural, and historical contexts. Organizing Construct: Significance, definition, and philosophical bases of gender-sensitive theor...

In this study, role involvement, role integration (including role stress and role satisfaction), and perceived health were examined in 50 Asian American women who were caregivers of aging parents in addition to being wives, mothers, and employees. Their mean age was 47.8 years. Twenty-nine of the participants were Chinese and 21 Filipino, with an a...

Keywords:women's work;social policy;research;health

To describe how Korean immigrant women tend to describe their work experiences within their daily lives and how they relate their work to the symptoms experienced during midlife. Cross-sectional study using methodological triangulation. Using a convenience sampling method, 119 Korean immigrant women were recruited for the quantitative phase, and 21...

Changes in health and illness of individuals create a process of transition, and clients in transition tend to be more vulnerable to risks that may in turn affect their health. Uncovering these risks may be enhanced by understanding the transition process. As a central concept of nursing, transition has been analyzed, its components identified, and...

More women are seeking outside employment worldwide. However, the spousal role with all that it entails remains a significant core for women, particularly in developing countries. How women experience this role when they are also employed in low-income jobs has not been uncovered adequately. One hundred and ninety Egyptian women who are employed in...

The meanings of menopause among a vulnerable group of women—low-income Korean immigrant women—were explored using a cross-sectional descriptive research design focusing on how these meanings were constructed with their daily life experiences. Twenty-one peri- or post-menopausal women were recruited using convenience sampling methods; 2-hour in-dept...

It is imperative to further develop theoretical bases in nursing, which incorporate diversities and complexities in nursing phenomena, and which consider sociopolitical, cultural, and historic contexts of nursing encounters. Situation-specific theories are proposed in this work as a future direction of such theoretical bases in nursing. Philosophic...

Even though there are advancements in research related to culturally competent care, there is an increasing realization that coherent theories and a research base to guide health care that is culturally competent is yet to be fully developed. In this paper, cultural competence of the scales measuring menopausal symptoms are critically analyzed in l...

Despite the increasing number of studies on the menopausal experience of Asian women, the focus of the studies has been on simple comparisons of their symptoms with Western women's and other disease-oriented research topics. To propose directions for future research on menopause, we analyzed and critiqued 158 studies on the menopausal experience of...

Despite the increasing number of studies on the menopausal experience of Asian women, the focus of the studies has been on simple comparisons of their symptoms with Western women's and other disease-oriented research topics. To propose directions for future research on menopause, we analyzed and critiqued 158 studies on the menopausal experience of...

Quality care requires a body of knowledge that reflects the experiences and the responses of the marginalized populations to health and illness, and requires demarginalization of nursing knowledge. We argue the significance of developing an understanding of people who are marginalized, and organize our arguments and discussions into four sections:...

To extend the previous model of transitions by including the experiences of low-income Korean immigrant women in the United States during their menopausal transition. The extension results in a situation-specific theory of Korean immigrant women's menopausal transition. Findings from a study of menopausal transition among Korean immigrant women wer...

The symptoms experienced during menopausal transition of a vulnerable group of women, low income Korean immigrants, are described in this paper. The findings demonstrated that (a) the types of the symptoms that the women reported were different from those reported by Western women; (b) the women tended to normalize their symptoms; and (c) their sym...

To explore patients' concerns during the admission transition to cardiac surgery. A descriptive qualitative design. Four hospitals in northern Taiwan, Republic of China. A purposive sample consisting of 40 adult patients (20 men and 20 women) who planned to have cardiac surgery. Age range was 20 to 70 years (mean 50.1 years). The types, levels, com...

Members of the nursing community have been engaged in numerous debates, some of which are related to the roles of holism and particularism in the care of clients and in the development of nursing knowledge. Others center on most and least congruent methodologies for nursing research, These healthy debates have played a significant role in invigorat...

Societal conceptualizations and images of women and work have an impact on the way health and social policies are formulated and how these policies affect the lives, health, and well-being of women. Nurses can expand the visibility of women's work and promote gender-sensitive policies related to women's work and health within the discipline of nurs...

As more women worldwide enter the labor force, debate has been generated over how this additional work role influences women's health. In this study, we explored the work, maternal, and spousal roles of 59 auxiliary nurses in two university-affiliated Mexican hospitals. Participants completed questionnaires that included demographics, a women's rol...

Most breast cancer symptoms are discovered by women themselves, and at least one third of these women will be aware of their symptoms for 3 months or more before seeking an initial provider evaluation. The authors identify personal, social, and environmental influences on women's intention to seek an immediate provider evaluation (helpseek) versus...

In this article the authors examine the ways in which the definition of work as paid employment has affected women's health research, the knowledge and understanding of the relationships between women's work and health, and health and social policies. The authors argue for research and public policy based on an expanded definition of women's work,...

There is an urgency to the development of culturally competent care. This urgency is due to increasing diversity, increasing disclosure of identities, care delivery moving to homes, and increasing inequity in access to health care. The development of a knowledge base for culturally competent care is constrained by substantive and methodological iss...

The purpose of this chapter is to discuss global issues related to women's health. Several universal issues were selected for presentation to provide a context for understanding health care for women and to challenge readers to identify potential threats to quality care. In addition, principles that have been proposed for the development and implem...

Recruitment and retention of nursing personnel is a major problem in many parts of the world, particularly developing countries. Strategies for promoting job satisfaction can help reduce the costs of high turnover and increase the quality of patient care. As part of a larger international study on women's health, a convenience sample of 59 Mexican...

This qualitative study was based on individual interviews with 75 Brazilian women in an impoverished peri-urban squatter community (favela) in southeastern Brazil. The purposes of the study were to describe women's role involvement in domestic and employment contexts; identify stresses and satisfactions of maternal, spousal, and employment roles; a...

This qualitative study was based on individual interviews with 75 Brazilian women in an impoverished peri-urban squatter community (favela) in southeastern Brazil. The purposes of the study were to describe women's role involvement in domestic and employment contexts; identify stresses and satisfactions of maternal, spousal, and employment roles; a...

Although women are participating more in the formal workforce, the majority are employed primarily in low-income and low-status occupations. While work roles may provide women with some rewards, employment may also create many stressful demands on their daily lives. As part of an international study, 60 female Brazilian clerical workers responded t...

This study was designed to explore the daily lived experiences of a group of employed, low-income Mexican women in their maternal and spousal roles The participants were 41 auxiliary nurses recruited from two large urban hospitals in Mexico Data were collected through the Women's Roles Interview Protocol (WRIP), which solicited the participants' pe...

Researcher/participant matching has been used in nursing research as a strategy for the development of culturally competent knowledge. In this manuscript, the complexities inherent in matching in nursing research are discussed. In raising and discussing issues and questions related to matching, we argue that although matching may be one of the stra...

An overwhelming majority of domestic workers in most of the world are women, but domestic work is largely invisible and devalued. A women's roles approach was used to describe and analyze the satisfying and stressful aspects of the domestic work role for a randomly stratified sample (N=60) of women who worked as daily domestic workers in Cali, a la...

Literature specifically focused on women as immigrants and on the nature and quality of the immigrant experience is limited. Similarly, in spite of early Arab immigration to the different regions of the world, there is a limited knowledge base regarding the dynamics and problems involved in their integration into their new society. In this article...

This article presents qualitative findings concerning women's maternal roles, based on interviews conducted in a study on role integration and health, in a Colombian sample of 60 women who are "por día" domestic workers. The results describe the women's worldview as they discuss the stresses and the satisfactions of their mothering roles. The resul...

Having their children enter adolescence presents new demands on the role functions of Jordanian immigrant women in the United States. Such demands require modifications in traditional parenting approaches. The authors attempted to uncover and describe the experiences of Jordanian immigrant mothers (N = 30) in parenting their adolescents in the Unit...

The internationally accepted definition of PHC is qualitatively different from that of PC. Both PC, which produces professionally and institutionally driven services, and PHC, which creates community-based and community-driven services, can serve Nursing's Agenda for Health Care Reform.

This is a report of a phenomenological study of Colombia's "por día" domestic workers that examined their actions in promoting their health, in preventing illnesses, and in caring for themselves. A cross sectional sample of 60 per diem female domestic workers in one large city in Colombia were interviewed using open-ended interview questions about...

The first purpose of this article is to argue the significance of using international and culturally diverse exemplars in developing nursing knowledge. The second is to identify some urgent priorities in the development of nursing knowledge, particularly as related to women's health. The lived experiences of three women from Brazil, Egypt, and Colo...

The first purpose of this article is to argue the significance of using international and culturally diverse exemplars in developing nursing knowledge. The second is to identify some urgent priorities in the developmnt of nursing knowledge, particularly as related to women's health. The lived experiences of three women from Brazil, Egypt, and Colom...

here have been numerous dia- logues in nursing about its mis- sion and definition, but a refinement of existing definitions has yet to be of- fered. This article is written with the goal of maintaining a vigorous dis- course. The phenomena of concern to the discipline of nursing that have been described by various theorists, and gen- erally accepte...

One of the most significant, yet not fully developed goals of doctoral education is the graduation of scholars who can make a major contribution to the discipline of nursing. There have been many discourses and debates about the essential criteria for quality in doctoral programs that create and promote scholarliness. Scholarliness in nursing inclu...

The article presents the qualitative findings about the spousal role of women who are in per diem domestic work in Colombia. Sixty participants obtained through a random sample of employer homes were interviewed about the nature and the quality of their roles. The results provided are based on the participants' descriptions of their subjective expe...

This article explicates marginalization as a guiding concept for the development of nursing knowledge that values diversity. The seven key properties of marginalization as it applies to the domain of nursing are (1) intermediacy, (2) differentiation, (3) power, (4) secrecy, (5) reflectiveness, (6) voice, and (7) liminality. Through examination of e...

The article presents the qualitative findings about the spousal role of women who are in per diem domestic work in Colombia. Sixty participants obtained through a random sample of employer homes were interviewed about the nature and the quality of their roles. The results provided are based on the participants' descriptions of their subjective expe...