The aim of this booklet is to describe how the concepts of self-care are applied to nursing practice. It is based on a consensus reached by a group of nurses, all expert practitioners of self-care, who attended a collaborative conference in March 1994 to consider two questions: what is self-care; and how can self-care be recognised in practice. The booklet comprises of three types of information: an operational definition of self-care including a detailed description of the constituent steps of a self-care approach; a description of visible factors indicative of a self-care approach; and examples of applications of self-care.