The word 护士 is formed by combining two characters: 护 (hù), which means "to protect", "to guard", or "to nurse", and 士 (shì), a classical term for a person of a specific profession or a scholar-official, often used to denote a respectable professional. Together, they create the concept of a "protecting professional" or "guardian scholar", which directly and elegantly conveys the essential role of a nurse as a trained, caring guardian of health.