Dear friends, colleagues, contributors, and guests from Shanghai and around the world,
Welcome to the 7th Annual Shanghai International Nursing Forum.
欢迎来自世界各地参加第七届上海国际护理论坛的朋友们！
One of the greatest challenges facing health services and health education today is that of elder care. With the tremendous strides that have been made in medical technology and treatments in the past 50 years, the life expectancy of citizens — not only in China, but around the world — has soared. For this, we are all deeply grateful, yet the advancement has brought new challenges with it. Excellent geriatric health care has unique elements that must be taken into account if we wish to serve our communities well. These elements have to do not only with treatment, but with elder-caregiver relationships, and with caring and friendly communication. It's one thing to promote high-quality elder care in the classroom, another to produce good geriatric nursing research, and yet another to give good care to real patients.
That, then, is the reason for this year's Forum theme: bringing theory to practice in geriatric care. It is our desire to not only consider the theoretical approaches to serving the elderly as nurses, but to work together to uncover new avenues for real, practical nursing care. Today, we want to explore current theories and the state of research on geriatric care, but we want to do so with an eye toward the nursing home, toward the long-term care facility, and toward the hospitals where we, as nurses, are actually serving geriatric patients. Today, we want to step out of the ivory tower of the medical university — even the research university — and into the lives of the elderly, who are looking to us. Yes, they do rely on their doctors, but it is their nurses whom they see and talk with most. It is on us, as their nurses, that the greatest burden of care falls, and so we must ensure that we are fully equipped to meet the healthcare challenges that they are facing.
We must reject the idea that a nursing home or a geriatric facility is a second-class facility for second-class nurses. Far from it. The residents there may be our own parents or grandparents.
They are the generation that went before us, that fought for us and provided for us. It is only right that we, their nurses and nurse leaders, ensure that the standard of care reflects the very best that international research has discovered. That is the worthy goal that we will be exploring today.
如今健康服务和健康教育面临的最大挑战之一是老年护理。随着过去五十年来医疗技术和治疗方面取得的巨大进步，人们的寿命不仅在中国乃至世界各地都有所延长。为此，我们非常高兴，然而进步也带来了新的挑战。优秀的老年健康护理有独特的元素，如果我们希望为我们的社区服务，就必须加以考虑。这些要素不仅仅是治疗，而且要与老年人有着良好关系以及与他们之间建立关爱和友爱地沟通。在课堂上推广高质量的老年护理是一方面，另一个是发掘好的老年护理研究内容，其次是对真正的病人给予很好的照顾。
基于此，今年论坛的的主题是：弥合老年护理中理论和临床实践间的差距。我们希望不仅考虑将老年人作为护士服务的理论方法，而且共同努力，为实际护理提供新的途径。现在，我们想探讨现有的老年护理研究的理论和现状，但我们这样做，是着眼于养老院，着眼于长期护理机构，以及主要为老年人服务的老年医院。今天，我们想走出医学院的象牙塔，甚至走出研究型大学，进入那些期待我们这么做的老年人家中。是的，那些老年人依靠医生，但是他们看到最多的和沟通最多的都是护士。作为护士，护理人员最大的重担落在我们身上，所以我们必须确保我们有能力应对他们所面临的医疗保健挑战。
我们必须摒弃这样的想法，即养老院或老人机构是二流护士呆着的二流机构。这是大错特错的。那里的居民可能是我们自己的父母或祖父母。他们是我们的上一代人，他们为了我们辛苦付出、照顾我们。我们能做的就是我们护士、护理领导层确保护理水平，反映出国际研究发现的最佳状态。这是我们今天为之探索的价值与意义。