Finding the standard life right definition for nursing is crucial – but beware death by dictionary

There was a dark age in nursing’s history when the profession began eating dictionaries. It coincided with early moves into higher education. Suddenly nursing journals expanded with a pseudoscholastic bog of long but superfluous words which, for example, translated bedpan into non-ambulatory personage’s evacuation vessel. And no nursing conference was complete without at least two speakers opening with the words: ‘Before coming here today I looked up “quality” (or some other equally well known word) in the Oxford English Dictionary…’ Stifled yawns all round.