One of the less publicized qualities of nursing is the immense diversity it offers. In this special Essence of Nursing issue, you will meet a dozen nurses who share a strong desire to help others yet have shaped their individual nursing careers based on their own passions and visions.

The wide array of career paths among these nurses demonstrates the expansive boundaries and flexibility of the nursing profession - a profession which has allowed them to do extraordinary things and become much more than they ever imagined.

International & National

Some you will meet are conducting important research and are recognized nationally for what they do. Nancy Glass, PhD, MPH, RN, is a global health expert who has traveled all over the world to access health needs and work with policymakers to find ways to improve people's health and welfare.

Judy Ozbolt, PhD, RN, FAAN, also works with experts from around the world, focusing on the study of nursing informatics. She believes developing more precise standards and terminology for nurses will not only help them to treat patients better, but will also validate their roles in patient outcomes.

Dennis W. Jones, MSN, RN, was inspired by nursing after watching two male nursing pioneers in action. He is now a critical care transport nurse and lectures on lateral violence to others of his profession.

Safety & Environment

Other nurses you will read about see themselves as advocates for patient safety. Paula Graling, MSN, RN, CNOR, CNS, immediate past president of the Association of periOperative Registered Nurses, collaborated with other professionals in the U.S. to develop a fire prevention toolkit to make ORs across the country safer.

Recently retired OR nurse Helen French, BSN, RN, continues to be a patient advocate who strongly supports the passage of laws requiring a registered nurse circulator to be present in the OR during invasive procedures. She also promotes a recycling program which not only greatly reduces hospital waste, but provides medical supplies to missions around the world.

Another retiree, 90-year-old Mary K. Thomas, reveals how times have changed since the days when she first became a nurse during World War II, and how the lines between her duties and those of the country doctors she worked with often blurred.

Creativity

Many of those you will read about here are passionate about teaching, mentoring and leading other nurses. Deborah Hobbs, MSN, RN, is a refresher course nurse advocate who enjoys helping other nurses ease back into the profession they love.

Kathy Baker, MSN, RN, puts her leadership skills to use making supplemental nursing - the float pool - a positive experience for the 150 nurses on her team at the Virginia Commonwealth University Health System in Richmond.

Published Authors & Beauticians

Several nurses you will read about have found their niche in serving a particular patient population. Sarah Langford, who became an RN this spring, has made it her goal to work with immigrants and refugee populations. She even co-authored a children's book dealing with dementia in a Hmong family while she was a nursing student.

Not all the nurses in this 2008 Essence of Nursing arrived at nursing by the same route. Ernestine Cosby, MSN, APRN,BC, vice president and chief nursing officer for Sheppard Pratt Health System, Baltimore, began there in 1969 as a beautician. She now manages more than 200 nurses, plus social workers, rehab staff and direct care workers.

Other nurses weren't given many career choices at all. Margaret Kirby's father told her he'd send her to school only if she would become a secretary or a nurse. Fortunately for the people of Washington, DC, she chose the latter. Kirby, MA, RN, has worked many years with So Others Might Eat, helping the organization offer more healthcare services to the needy.

Educating Teens

Linda Kelly, RN, FNE-A, always dreamed of being a nurse, and finally made her lifelong dream a reality at age 50, leaving behind a lucrative position in health insurance administration. A decade later, she has found her niche in a role that allows her to teach young women how to have healthy relationships and protect themselves from sexual predators. She is the clinical program manager of a sexual assault forensic examiner program at the Greater Baltimore Medical Center.

Those featured in the 2008 Essence of Nursing special issue have taken the profession of nursing and molded it in very different, but practical ways, creating careers that are as varied as they are satisfying. But more than being just a profession, nursing is tightly woven into who they are as people - exemplified by the way they think, care, lead, teach and consistently continue to learn and improve. It is their essence.

- Lisa O. Monroe