[Research in nursing: an interdisciplinary field].

This paper describes the growing importance of research in the nursing field and reviews its development since Florence Nightingale's day in the last century, and its revitalization with the help of the international organizations. Research, an empirical process by nature, is the application of the scientific method, in which reliable solutions to concrete problems are found by objective procedures. One of its characteristics is the framing of concepts, that is, the development of a logical, scientific chain of reasoning by which relationships between facts are established or inferred. Nursing embraces many activities that are traditionally referred to as the nursing process which, stated simply, is no more than an application of the scientific method. That it is applied with greater rigor in the sciences themselves does not detract from the scientific dimensions of nursing practice. It is perhaps going too far to regard all professional nurses as researchers. They may, however, be expected to have the intellectual curiosity to pursue lines of inquiry in their extensive field. They should continue to do so as participants in a joint effort with other disciplines to solve problems relating to health.