Nursing at the crossroads.

Presented from University College Cardiff, Emma Freud examines the future of nursing as a career and a profession. Anne Keen describes the recent history of nursing, her own early career as a nurse and how independence in nurses has been suppressed in previous years. She believes that taking responsibility and being allowed to be professional carers in their own right is essential. Nurse Teacher Practitioner Jackie Murray describes how Project 2000 is a nurse teaching programme which will change the nurses traditional role. At Oxford's Radcliffe Hospital in the 1980s an experiment was conducted in which nurses were allowed to run all aspects of a hospital ward, Beeson Ward. The experiment was a huge success - the patients did well and there was less need for medication than usual.