On this month's cover is a portrait of the 1924 Grace Hospital School of Nursing basketball team. Most nursing schools had basketball teams in their early days-as far back as the 1920s. This photo of the Grace Hospital team was featured in the September 1924 issue of AJN in an article titled "Basketball in Schools of Nursing in Detroit."
The author of the article, Mildred Churchill, described how the newly formed basketball league brought nursing students from Detroit hospitals into friendly competition, playing in hopes of winning trophies-even "small gold basket ball charm[s]"-contributed by physicians from the various hospitals. (At the time the article was published, the Grace Hospital team had won every game so far.) The students were coached by Ruth Barber, who Churchill noted was "specially qualified for this field as she is a graduate nurse, and therefore realizes recreational tendencies and requisites for physical maintenance."
That understanding of the importance of maintaining physical well-being is a fundamental aspect of nursing. Often, however, nurses may not practice sufficient self-care owing to competing priorities and the demands of caring for others. To read a study that analyzed how today's RNs fare in terms of health-promoting behaviors like physical activity, stress management, and more, see "An Investigation into the Health-Promoting Lifestyle Practices of RNs" in this issue.-Diane Szulecki, associate editor