Based on a holistic perspective, the curricula of the SON educational programs encompass the major concepts of person, health, environment, and nursing. The person is defined as an individual, a family, an aggregate, a community, or a society, each having relationships with and responsibilities to the others. The person has unique environmental, physiological, psychosocial-cultural, philosophical, developmental and spiritual dimensions and possesses inherent dignity and worth. The person s unique, complex needs are communicated through a variety of behaviors across the lifespan. Health is a dynamic state and implies a continuous response by the person to stimuli from the environment.
Nurses are accountable for assisting persons toward health.
Each person has the right to health care provided through a collaborative process, resulting in informed health decisions and shared accountability for outcomes. The environment consists of physiological, psychosocial-cultural, philosophical, developmental, and spiritual conditions and forces impacting the person s health. Environmental conditions and forces continually change and interact, forming a complex context for nursing practice. The nurse has the responsibility to assess the environment at the level impacting the person, manage its constraints, and utilize its resources to promote the health of the person. Nursing is enacted by applying the nursing process within the roles of clinician, teacher, manager, and researcher.