THE NURSE'S TRAINING
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
Sm,—Excellent though the reforms suggested by your medical correspondent may be in principle, I quite. fail to see how they could usefully be applied in practical nursing.
If, as is suggested, nurses are relieved of routine work during their probationary years, who is to undertake these duties ? Your contributor suggests that bed-making, washing and sanitary attendance—three duties which, together with re- dressings, comprise the greater part of a nurse's work—could be relegated, in convalescing cases, to orderlies. In actual practice, such patients attend to these matters themselves. In the majority of cases, especially in general hospitals, it is essen- tial that the patient be attended only by persons equipped with some knowledge of medical science.
If, as an alternative, these duties are allocated to trained and certified nurses, then nothing could be more calculated to discourage eligible girls from training for such a career.
Actually it is not necessary to seek so far for the improve- ments desired. Whilst bed-making may, or may not, be a nurse's work, the daily scrubbing of lockers and lavatory shelves—to mention only two routine duties at present assigned to probationers—certainly is not.
Dr. Sanguinetti trusts that " care will be taken not to arouse quite unnecessary discontent with a life which has its compensa- tions."
The fact is that hospital authorities have for too long exploited the natural compassion of the female sex ; the fact that male nurses, working alongside their " weaker " colleagues, are offered better conditions and shorter hours is proof of this. Would Dr. Sanguinetti care to work ten hours a day with half an hour break for dinner ? Or, if he were of the opposite sex, have his employer dictate as to whether he should wear a
hat in private life or appear with or without stockinged feet on the tennis court ? The extraordinary, and quite unne- cessary, restrictions imposed upon curses, especially during
their off-duty hours, are monstrous. • I am not a nurse defending nurses, but for seven years, in this hospital and that, I have been tended by these unhonoured heroes, and knowing their life, I an only wonder that the hospitals have nurses at all. There is no problem ; it is only a matter of fair consideration for services rendered.—Yours
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