Find Your Inspiration to Advocate, Lead and Care! Registered nurses have always embodied the theme for this year’s National Nurses Week: "Advocating, Leading, Caring". When R.N.s visit the American Nurses Association (ANA) this Spring, they can’t help concur with its President, Karen Daley that ANA is their quintessential advocate; video galleries, pledges and other resources on the site show that celebrating a nurse’s calling is about so much more than remembering to wear a pin this week. Capture the spirit during May 6-12 and take it with you the rest of the year! It’s empowering to reflect on the amazing history of your vocation. Before the nursing career path became what it is today—the #1 career advertised on U.S. News & World Report’s List of Best Careers in 2012—nurses worked in relative obscurity. It’s hard to believe fewer than 20 R.N.s attended the first ANA convention in 1896—even more surprising that back then, they weren’t technically R.N.s. There were no laws licensing nurses at that time. This International Nurses Week, thank ANA for helping R.N.s become the backbone of American healthcare! Look at how far this profession has come, employing more than 3 million [+]