Background The training of the Bachelor of Nursing, with more than a century of experience in Cuba, has undergone a sustained process of change, which has led to a significant contribution to the achievement of indicators that support the efficiency and effectiveness of international career. During the colonial period, the care of patients in Cuba was performed by practitioners through the empirical imitation of basic procedures that applied at the time. The teaching of nursing in Cuba begins with the formation of a technical level, in the late nineteenth century during the American intervention in 1899 with the founding of the First Practical School of Nursing in the formerly known “Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes”. Hospital – the present Manuel Fajardo university hospital. During the early twentieth century, about 8 schools of nursing were established in some provinces.

Since 1959, the accelerated development of the Cuban public health brought changes in the schools and nursing programs. Nursing training was characterized by an increase in the number of schools and the continuous improvement of plans and training programs. Nursing studies at the university level were initiated in 1976 for licensed practical nurses and in 1987, it was extended to senior high school graduates (12 schooling years) with no previous nursing studies, with a 5-year plan of study that began in Havana, and was later extended to all the Universities of Medical Sciences in the country.

At present the curriculum for the training of nursing graduates is characterized by having a draft that incorporates contemporary trends in university education. It emphasizes early involvement of the student work, from the beginning of the study through on-the-job training activities, in the formative period of five years in the classroom. The uniqueness of this model is that during the fifth year of the career training program, the main integrative discipline is applied in the work scenarios, with the participation of a the tutor who is a nursing trainer who develops a relevant role in the education and instruction learners:

Nursing is a profession of health sciences, whose object of study is the provision of nursing care to the individual, family, community and environment. It deals with diagnosing and treating the area of competence of individual and collective responses to the manifestations of health-disease process, applying the logic of the Nursing Care Process as a scientific method of the profession, taking into account promotion, prevention, treatment and rehabilitation to ensure the physical, mental and social welfare of the individual. This process also uses teaching, administrative and research skills to ensure the quality and optimization of the nursing services in the pursuit of excellence.

It is a 5-years curriculum, with a face-to-face training model for those who have completed their senior high school or any equivalent level.

It aims at training a professional with a broad profile, mainly based on a solid basic education, enabling him/her to solve the main health problems that arise in different areas of their performance. The basic training concept has gone more broadly, incorporating equal priority basic aspects going from the race-specific to other more general issues, essential for today’s professional. There is a balance between the scientific and professional skills development during the training process, through the studies. It has structured a research-work that should encourage the development of the skills required for the future professional and he/she should also have an acceptable degree of independence in designing a research project on a health problem identified in the context of performance. All subjects have a final assessment, characterized by the provision of more value to the frequent and partial evaluation, an increase of its qualitative and integrative view, and the inclusion of a selection of content not offered previously. In the case of the nursing discipline, the final evaluations also include content taught in the optional and electives courses that are delivered.

Education and instruction go together, the same as the work-study principle, which is embodied in the work and education in fundamental organizational form of the training process are the two fundamental principles of any nursing with a bachelor degree.

The fundamental principles underlying the training are the priority of the educational aspects of the training process, which are very close to the instructions and the link between study and work, which historically has resulted in the Bachelor of Sciences studies of the adoption of the on-the–job training skills as a fundamental organizational form.

The training process, in which the objectives and essential content are structured, i.e. vertically with regards to subjects, and horizontally regarding the academic years is understood as an essential element of curriculum design.

Correspondingly, interdisciplinary or transversal curriculum strategies have been established and they are aimed at going deeper in the students´ preparation.

A professional who has acquired the scientific skills – techniques for care and support of healthy or sick people (children, pregnant women , teenagers, adults and elderly), family and community, performing administrative, teaching, research and care functions, in institutions and services in any of the three levels of health care, a professional with a decision-making authority and deep professional knowledge in the biological, psychosocial and environment, and having theoretical and practical skills in specific and high complex techniques when performing his/her profession, and also trained in the invasive procedures

 1. No-satisfaction of the needs of the healthy or sick people.

2. No-satisfaction of the needs of families, groups and communities.

3. Humoral and clinical responses to diagnostic and therapeutic actions of different nature. 4. Difficulty in establishing communication.

5. Risks and epidemiological changes and other hygienic environment. 6. No satisfaction of the individual and collective educational needs

7. Problematic situations in their job specifications which undoubtedly lead to scientific problems of the profession and related fields.

8. Administrative nursing requirements in health services that affect the professional´s work .

Nursing care to the individual, family and community healthy, people at risk or sick links in a reciprocal relationship with their natural and social environment, based on human health needs and their satisfaction through the implementation of the Nursing Care Process, extended to family and community.

This nursing professional will perform at the three levels of care and at different levels and places of the administrative, care, teaching and research structures.

To Diagnose: The performance of the Nursing Diagnosis applied to the individual, family and the community taking into account the context in which it develops and their professional competence. This diagnosis is characterized by being in correspondence with human needs and health problems, either real or potential risk. It contains the issues to be dealt with independently by the nurse. It involves the accuracy of individual and collective responses to the manifestations of health-disease process and results from the assessment as part of the professional method.

To Treat: The planning and running of a nursing care by independent and interdependent actions, taking into account the diagnoses made for the solutions of the detected situations in time of peace, war and disaster-like situations in relation to their professional competence.

To Research: The implementation of the scientific method in addressing priority scientific issues that arise in their clinical, teaching and administrative practice, in connection with their professional competence. To Manage: The implementation of administrative processes and management practice in nursing and health in relation to their professional competence. To Educate: The development of the teaching-learning process in the training of nursing human resources, personnel and activities related to health education to individuals, families, and community.