Virginia Henderson

Virginia Henderson was an American nurse, researcher, theorist and writer, born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1897 and dead in 1996 at the age of 98. She graduated from the US Army School of Nursing in 1921, later earned her degrees at Teachers College, Columbia University, taught there from 1934 to 1948 and from 1953 worked at the Yale School of Nursing. She is best known for her definition of the unique function of the nurse, which stresses helping the individual, sick or well, to do the activities that contribute to health or recovery, and for a need-based nursing theory that sorts nursing care into fourteen components. She revised and co-wrote a widely used nursing textbook, directed the Nursing Studies Index and received the first Christiane Reimann Prize in 1985. She is often called the first lady of nursing.