Page 259 - alligood 8th edition_Neat

14

CHAP TER

Dorothea E. Orem
1914 to 2007

Self-Care Deficit Theory of Nursing

Violeta A. Berbiglia and Barbara Banfield

“Nursing is practical endeavor, but it is practical endeavor engaged in by persons
who have specialized theoretic nursing knowledge with developed capabilities
to put this knowledge to work in concrete situations of nursing practice”
(Orem, 2001, p. 161).

Orem’s early nursing experiences included operat-
Credentials and Background of the ing room nursing, private duty nursing (home and
Theorist hospital), hospital staff nursing on pediatric and adult
Dorothea Elizabeth Orem, one of America’s foremost medical and surgical units, evening supervisor in the
nursing theorists, was born in Baltimore, Maryland, emergency room, and biological science teaching.
in 1914. She began her nursing career at Providence Orem held the directorship of both the nursing school
Hospital School of Nursing in Washington, DC, and the Department of Nursing at Providence Hospi-
where she received a diploma of nursing in the early tal, Detroit, from 1940 to 1949. After leaving Detroit,
1930s. Orem received a BS in Nursing Education she spent 8 years (1949 to 1957) in Indiana working at
from Catholic University of America (CUA) in 1939, the Division of Hospital and Institutional Services of
and she received an MS in Nursing Education from the Indiana State Board of Health. Her goal was to
the same university in 1946. upgrade the quality of nursing in general hospitals

Photo credit: Gerd Bekel Archives, Cloppenburg, Germany.
Previous authors: Susan G. Taylor, Angela Compton, Jeanne Donohue Eben, Sarah Emerson, Nergess N. Gashti, Ann Marriner
Tomey, Margaret J. Nation, and Sherry B. Nordmeyer. Sang-arun Isaramalai is acknowledged for research and editorial assistance in
a previous edition.

240