Kirsten Stallknecht

Kirsten Stallknecht (1937 to 2021) was a Danish nurse who led her profession at home and abroad. Raised in Copenhagen, she began nursing training in 1956 in Holbæk, qualified at Rigshospitalet in 1960 and in 1965 studied teaching and management at the Danish College of Nursing at Aarhus University. She joined the executive of the Danish Nurses' Organization in 1966 and became its chair in 1967, remaining chairperson for twenty-eight years. Under her leadership the association also took on the role of a nurses' union, won the right to dispute, and secured state recognition of the Nurses' Unemployment Fund. In 1980 she established the Danish Institute for Health and Nursing Research. She served as president of the International Council of Nurses from 1997 to 2001, received its Christiane Reimann Prize in 2013, and was made a Knight of the Order of the Dannebrog.