• Enhancing Nursing Practice Through the Sustainable Development Goals: Health Equity and Gender Equality

This paper examines how Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3, Good Health and Well-Being, and SDG 5, Gender Equality, can enhance nursing practice by addressing health inequities, reproductive rights, and gender-based barriers to care. Drawing on global and Scottish contexts, it argues that these goals are closely interconnected and highly relevant to nursing because nurses are central to delivering equitable, person-centred, and rights-based healthcare. The discussion highlights how structural inequalities, including poverty, discrimination, restrictive policies, and limited access to reproductive and gender-affirming services, continue to affect marginalised populations disproportionately. While Scotland has made progress through universal healthcare, menstrual equity policies, and women’s health initiatives, significant disparities remain for low-income women, migrants, LGBTQ+ individuals, and transgender people. The paper explores nursing’s role in responding to these challenges through advocacy, ethical practice, leadership, and education, in line with the NMC Code and NHS Scotland’s Four Pillars of Practice. It concludes that achieving SDGs 3 and 5 requires stronger policy reform, gender-sensitive nursing education, workforce investment, and greater nursing influence in decision-making. Advancing these goals will strengthen nursing practice and support a more inclusive, sustainable, and equitable healthcare system.