[Nursing: organization, functions, and efficacy]

This article analyzes the defining traits of primary health care: length, accessibility, integrity, and coordination/continuity while bearing in mind the influence which these traits have on the organizational purpose of nursing. The evolution of nursing is also studied as it relates to the various reform phases in primary health care: the impulse phase and the implementation phase. A few aspects of this article were presented at the IV Primary Health Care Nursing Meeting which took place in Murcia.