Nursing has been practiced for so many years. Nursing education existed around the world as early as 250 BC. Only the lay nurses and religious men who committed their lives to serve their community had the opportunity to study nursing. It became a vocation with strong devotion for the sick and the poor, most especially the ones who were wounded in wars with little attention paid for quality of care (GCU, 2013). Following the World War 2, to help resolve the issue in nursing shortage, Mildred Montag revolutionized the 2 year associate degree in nursing education to train students formally emphasizing the technical aspects of nursing care without receiving a 4 year university degree (GCU, 2013). Today, many nurses graduated with associate degree in nursing (ADN) are being employed and get recognized by their skills that they acquired from their 2 year education.
There are differences in the competencies acquired between Associate degree prepared nurses and Bachelor of Science (BSN) degree in nursing graduate nurses. Although both degrees will qualify for the licensure exam for NCLEX, the Associate degree curriculum focuses more on the clinical skills training of the students whereas the 4-year Baccalaureate program emphasizes more on the knowledge, theory and research based aspects of nursing, leadership as well as management (Creasia and Friberg, 2011). ADN nurses roles are limited to the technical aspect of nursing care appropriate for patient and family in restrictive type