ABSTRACT
Introduction Nursing and other health professions have a social mandate to serve the world’s population, now numbered at 6,792,797,015 as of 18:45 UTC (EST+5) on October 25, 2009.1 When contemplating this obligation from a futurist perspective, one usually fi rst asks: “What is the current context of healthcare?” and “What do we as nurses and nursing bring to present healthcare systems?” Bridging the answers to these two questions helps to frame an understanding of the changes occurring in our healthcare systems and the opportunities that these changes hold for nursing. Answering these questions invariably brings one to the bold call to action for mobilizing technologies and the expert knowledge of informatics to address these opportunities.
