Objective To explore the experiences of front‐line nurses combating the coronavirus disease‐2019 epidemic. Design and Sample Fifteen front‐line nurses caring for COVID‐19 patients were recruited from two hospitals in Wuhan, China from January 26 to February 5, 2020. Data were collected through semi‐structured individual interviews and analyzed using standard qualitative methods. Results Four theme categories emerged from the data analysis: (a) “Facing tremendous new challenges and danger”; (b) “Strong pressure because of fear of infection, exhaustion by heavy workloads and stress of nursing seriously ill COVID‐19 patients”; (c) “Strong sense of duty and identity as a healthcare provider”; (d) “Rational understanding of the epidemic—the nurses believed that the epidemic would soon be overcome and would like to receive disaster rescue training.” Conclusions Although the intensive rescue work drained front‐line nurses, both physically and emotionally, they showed a spirit of dedication and felt a responsibility to overcome this epidemic. Their experiences provide useful insights into implementing a safer public health emergency rescue system in preparation for future outbreaks of infectious diseases. Specifically, psychological support and humanistic care should be provided to front‐line nurses to maintain their well‐being, and nationwide emergency rescue training and disaster education should be implemented.

This study aims to develop the expert consensus on nurse's human caring for Corona Virus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients in different sites, and thus provide a guideline on providing whole process and systematic caring for COVID-19 patients. Based on the frontline experiences of human caring for COVID-19 patients and the review of literature, the initial draft of consensus was made and finalized after online meeting and revisions. The experts reached consensus on the following parts: terms and definitions, principles of human caring for COVID-19 patients, and human caring measures for COVID-19 patients in different sites. The expert consensus is practical, concise, and reasonable for guiding the nurses providing human caring for COVID-19 patients, as well as other similar infectious diseases.