The factors, which influenced the development of the nursing theory, are closely associated with the history of nursing and the development of medical science in general. Originally, nursing presupposed only caring for the deceased and wounded by creating the necessary environment for recovery. The appearance of Florence Nightingale in the arena of world nursing has completely changed the principles and values of nursing in general. Thus, instead of simple ventilation and changing of the bandaging and watering those, who are unable to do it by themselves, nursing by Nightingale presupposed giving the required medication, removing the effluvia, if necessary, cleaning the rooms, etc. The key principles, which were pursued by nursing entail the following:
- Healing;
- Cooperation;
- Hope;
- Strength;
- Passion;
- Determination.
These aspects of nursing have changed the entire representation of creative means and provided more chances for the deceased and heavily wounded to recover. Another factor, which influenced seriously the entire sphere of nursing is the environmental factor of the workplace. Most of the nursing jobs were volunteer and presupposed only nursing as is without any medical help. All the medicines and remedies were appointed and provided only by doctors. When the job, as a paid position, became a common thing, nurses were assigned additional responsibilities, and they were obliged to create the required environment, follow patients’ health, observe the timetable of taking remedies and perform all the required means for disinfection of the rooms.
The psychological factors of the nursing working environment have also changed essentially. They work under physical overload due to long work hours and patient handling demands, which leads to a high incidence of MSDs. In short, the nursing work system often exceeds the limits and capabilities of human performance. HF/E research should be conducted to determine how these overloads can be reduced and how the limits and capabilities of performance can be accommodated. Ironically, the literature shows that there are studies to determine whether nurses can effectively perform tasks ordinarily performed by physicians.
Thus, contemporary medical studies should focus on the issues of how to simplify the working performance of nurses and how to ease their overloads, including psychological overloads. Finally, there is a strong necessity to emphasize that the real values of nursing and the values of caring are closely associated with the environment, and only environmental factors could influence the psychological and medical practices and theories, associated with nursing.