Marie-Claude Thifault

Historical thinking and the shaping of nursing identity.

Nursing history was a core component of nurse training programs as early as 1907, when American Adelaide Nutting published her three-volume history. However, it had all but disappeared by the end of the 20th century, supplanted by other subjects. The University of Ottawa Nursing History Research Unit developed two online nursing history courses, in English and French, respectively, which proved popular and prompted substantial interest in the reintroduction of nursing history to our curriculum. This article presents findings of a study that examined the concept of “historical thinking”—what it is, how it develops, and what it contributes to practice-based professions—based on student postings in these courses. Analysis suggests that primary sources and critical appraisal skills are keys to the formation of historical thinking, and that these courses fostered a strong sense of professional identity among participants who often lamented lack of previous exposure to nursing history. Online nursing history courses can capitalize on e-learning technologies, and fit crowded curricula and student learning styles, while extending the reach of historians beyond traditional university walls.

Sister Soldiers of the Great War: The Nurses of the Canadian Army Medical Corps by Cynthia Toman (review)

disconnect and isolation between Canada and overseas that did not exist in reality. The two groups were deeply and meaningfully connected via letters such as the ones we see in War-Torn Exchanges. Luckily for the Allied soldiers, these connections became very significant supply chains that supplemented the items purchased with the nurses’ own wages. Lastly, McKenzie delves into the growing demand many in the Canadian military had for national self-determination in the conduct of the war. Canadian nurses serving with the Canadian Army Medical Corps in the Great War were ranked and paid as officers. Being female military officers from a self-governing dominion gave these two women entry to remark unfavourably on the colonial approach of many British officials. That Laura and Mildred came from socially elite families made the condescension especially hard to bear. The nurses repeatedly reveal that dreadful British leadership in military health care regularly harmed troops from the British Dominions. As professional nurses, they thought they could do better if allowed to self-manage medical services, and, with the benefit of hindsight, they were probably right.

After the Asylum in Canada: Surviving Deinstitutionalisation and Revising History

Psychiatric deinstitutionalisation began in Canada in earnest during the 1960s and continues today. The downsizing and closure of custodial mental hospitals did not occur uniformly across the country, and regional variations in government, healthcare staff and community care policies profoundly shaped the process. The Saskatchewan Mental Hospital at Weyburn, the last asylum built in the Victorian style in the British Commonwealth, was the first to shut its doors, which it did dramatically in 1963. Others closed in stages, emptying wings and transitioning into outpatient care facilities or, as was the case in Alberta, repurposing the buildings for brain injured patients requiring shorter-term stays. Some facilities remained open with a reduced patient population and abandoned sections of the hospital that no longer conformed to the standards for privacy or health and safety regulations. Eastern Canadian provinces like Nova Scotia had not subscribed to large-scale custodial institutions in the first place, and while deinstitutionalisation from cottage-style facilities also occurred, the pace and impact of that change was profoundly different for staff, communities and ex-patients. Several Ontario-based institutions centralised their services, closing some and enlarging others. British Columbia’s iconic Riverview mental hospital continued to exist partially until 2012, looming large in cultural memory, as did many of these other monuments to what soon became a bygone era of psychiatric care. This regional variation in service delivery has in part characterised deinstitutionalisation in Canada, and also helps to underscore how patients from place to place may have encountered very different circumstances as they moved out of institutional care.