Mouth care practices in nursing and research-based education: an historical analysis of instructional nursing texts 1870-1997.

In this paper we examine 68 nursing textbooks published between 1870 and 1997 to examine the historical background to contemporary mouth care practice(s) in nursing and the extent to which they are based on research evidence. The analysis shows that, although there has been some variation in the types of equipment and preparations recommended for use over the past 120 years, descriptions of the actual nursing practices themselves have not varied greatly; nor has the discourse varied noticeably. Since the 1970s, there is a progressive increase in references to research. However, the instructional style and discursive frames in which mouth care is discussed reflect an approach to body care that is relatively unchanged in over a century. Individual nursing practices appear as decontextualised and procedurally oriented. With the exception of assessment techniques, written accounts of mouth care practices do not reflect the influence of more recent conceptual or rhetorical standpoints in nursing.