In 1853, just two years after her training began, Nightingale became the superintendent of the Harley Street Nursing Home. Once there she began to make improvements to the hospital that included organizing and training the staff, installing a lift to carry the patients' food and a method to pipe hot water to every floor. She saw that once the patient was truly cared for, his health improved.
Nightingale's efforts are most recognized from her time during the Crimean War. In 1854 Nightingale and a group of 38 nurses she had trained came to the hospital in Scutari, Turkey. At the time doctors did not even allow nurses on the ward, let alone allow them to care for patients. After the Battle of Inkerman, the wounded British soldiers were too numerous, and the doctors asked for help. Nightingale used her own money to buy fresh bandages and supplies for the hospital. Nightingale, an accomplished mathematician, calculated the mortality rate at 1,174 per every 10,000 men. Of these, 1,023 were from communicable disease. Had she not intervened, the diseases would have totally wiped out the British army.
Before Florence Nightingale, hospitals were dark and dirty places where more people died from diseases and infections than wounds from battle. Nurses were uneducated and unskilled and thought to be promiscuous. Wounded soldiers lay on the floor in their uniforms, unwashed and surrounded by filth. Before implementing her changes, soldiers were up to seven times more likely to die in the hospital than on the battlefield. By February 1855, just one year after arriving at the hospital, the mortality rate dropped from 60 percent to 42.7 percent. After the creation of a fresh source of water and the use of her own money to purchase fruits and vegetables, that number dropped to 2.2 percent.
Thanks to Florence Nightingale, hospitals today are cleaner and much safer. She realized from the conditions in the Turkish hospital that patients improved when they had cleaner surroundings and better food. By 1910 there were 1000 Nightingale Nursing Schools in the United States and across 20 other countries. Not only did she clean the hospitals, but she also implemented new and unconventional therapies such as music, touch, pets, light and aromatherapy.