Wellness nursing diagnoses: to be or not to be?

Problem orientation has dominated the nursing diagnosis movement since the early 1970s. The purpose of this article is to discuss how the new nursing diagnosis definition provides opportunity for a wellness perspective to be incorporated into the movement. Wellness is differentiated from illness and health, and conceptual model is offered to clarify these concepts. Work is reviewed from the growing number of authors who have supported wellness nursing diagnoses and advocated their incorporation into the current taxonomic listing. Cases of ill-well and well-ill clients and examples of wellness nursing diagnoses are included to emphasize the need for wellness diagnoses across the wide scope of nursing practice. Nurses are challenged to generate, research, and use wellness diagnoses in their practices.