title: Field interactions in aerovac nursing.
abstract: The purpose of this paper is to analyze the mutual, reciprocal action or influence between man and his environment. More specifically, an attempt will be made to view aeromedical evacuation as an airborne environmental field interacting with the human field, the patient. The aeromedical evacuation aircraft is the environmental field in which the medical crew members apply and adapt the principles of aerospace medicine to the inflight care of patients, the human field. Thus, an aim of aeromedical evacuation nursing is to promote the synergistic interaction between man and his environment. The conceptual background of this paper is based on the work of a nurse theoretician, Dr. Martha E. Rogers. Her assumptions about man, her principles of homeodynamics, and her goals of nursing service and practice seek to promote the synergistic interaction between man and environment; to strengthen the coherence and integrity of the human field; and to direct and redirect patterning the human and environmental fields for the realization of maximum health potential. By looking at some of the stresses of flight--altitude physiology and sensory alterations--within this conceptual framework, it is hoped an elementary analysis will generate testable hypotheses regarding patient care. Strategies for improving the quality of care given by the medical crew to aeromedical patients are continually sought.
mesh_terms: D000337:Aerospace Medicine; D000531:Altitude; D006801:Humans; D009732:Nursing Care / Q000379:methods*; D013312:Stress, Physiological; D014187:Transportation of Patients