A New Approach to Preparing Nurses for War: The Army School of Nursing

War and human conflict have historically propelled the profession of nursing forward, due to the intense demand for large numbers of efficient, high-quality nurses to care for injured troops. This article begins with an overview of nursing in the United States Army and Navy Nurse Corps and the influences of war on the advancement of American nursing, with a specific focus on the Army School of Nursing. As a response to the need for nurses in World War I, the Army School of Nursing was a novel approach to educating new nurses to be quickly mobilized in wartime and to provide nursing care at base hospitals across the United States. Students provided care to thousands of troops during the influenza pandemic of 1918, and several lost their lives providing care at these military encampments, including Fort Riley, the suspected starting point of the influenza epidemic in the United States.