Wise and humane management of the patient is the best safeguard against infection.
Florence NightingaleRead
The craving for 'the return of the day', which the sick so constantly evince, is generally nothing but the desire for light.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The sick often yearn for daylight, symbolizing hope and vitality amidst their struggles.
Florence Nightingale's quote reflects the emotional and psychological aspects of illness, highlighting how patients often crave sunlight and the return of day not just for its physical warmth and brightness, but as a metaphor for hope, healing, and the vitality that comes with life. It suggests that the desire for light is deeply intertwined with a longing for health and a return to normalcy.
Themes
LightHealthHopeHealingDaySickness
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about overcoming illness, one might say, 'As Nightingale observed, the craving for light represents our deep-seated hope for recovery.'
More from Florence Nightingale
All quotes →For us who Nurse, our Nursing is a thing, which, unless in it we are making progress every year, every month, every week, take my word for it we are going back. The more experience we gain, the more progress we can make.
Florence NightingaleRead
Everything you do in a patient's room, after he is 'put up' for the night, increases tenfold the risk of his having a bad night. But, if you rouse him up after he has fallen asleep, you do not risk - you secure him a bad night.
Florence NightingaleRead
If I could give you information of my life it would be to show how a woman of very ordinary ability has been led by God in strange and unaccustomed paths to do in His service what He has done in her. And if I could tell you all, you would see how God has done all, and I nothing. I have worked hard, very hard, that is all; and I have never refused God anything.
Florence NightingaleRead
The true foundation of theology is to ascertain the character of God. It is by the aid of Statistics that law in the social sphere can be ascertained and codified, and certain aspects of the character of God thereby revealed. The study of statistics is thus a religious service.
Florence NightingaleRead
I am of certain convinced that the greatest heroes are those who do their duty in the daily grind of domestic affairs whilst the world whirls as a maddening dreidel.
Florence NightingaleRead
Similar quotes
The dual scourge of hunger and malnutrition will be truly vanquished not only when granaries are full, but also when people's basic health needs are met and women are given their rightful role in societies
Gro Harlem BrundtlandRead
I spent the past week here in India getting a sense of the reality of HIV and AIDS in people's lives. Fathers and mothers are dying, leaving children with no support. Stigma and discrimination is ruining the family lives. There is an urgent need for education, information, and increased awareness of HIV and AIDS. The response needs to be now. We cannot afford to become fatigued.
Ralph FiennesRead
Health and appetite impart the sweetness to sugar, bread and meat.
Ralph Waldo EmersonRead
Concentrate on the correct movement each time you exercise, lest you do them improperly and thus lose all the vital benefits. Correctly executed and mastered to the point of subconscious reaction, these exercises will reflect grace and balance in your routine activities.
Joseph PilatesRead
Most important thing about your diet is who cooks it, a human or a corporation.
Michael PollanRead
A disruption of the circadian cycle—the metabolic and glandular rhythms that are central to our workaday life—seems to be involved in many, if not most, cases of depression; this is why brutal insomnia so often occurs and is most likely why each day’s pattern of distress exhibits fairly predictable alternating periods of intensity and relief.
William StyronRead