94-year-old top nursing honor winner vows to continue work

Zhang Jinyuan, 94, a winner of the Florence Nightingale Medal, has recently received the International Council of Nurses and the Florence Nightingale International Foundation International Achievement Award for this year.

The award is offered biennially to a practicing nurse with at least 10 years of nursing experience in one of the following domains of nursing: direct care, education, management or research.

Zhang, a nurse at Nachang First Hospital in Nanchang, capital city of East China's Jiangxi province, won the Florence Nightingale Medal, the world's highest nursing honor, in 2003.

She has been engaged in clinical nursing work for more than 40 years and has written more than 100 nursing papers and made 37 nursing research and reform projects. She has given more than 1,000 lectures.

In 2000, Zhang and other 16 retired colleagues together set up the Jiangxi Red Cross caring center, providing caring service at community level.

By 2023, the center has 19,251 volunteers to provide services to more than 700,000 residents at 350 communities in 19 provinces, regions and municipalities across the country.