It's one way of helping (1972)

It teaches you a lot about people, you know, not just sick people. It teaches you how to, you know, get along with people in all walks of life. And it just helps you a lot. You got to spend a lot of your time studying. And at the end of the three years, you know, you've got all in your head and you can get on with the real job. Yes, please. All right. [Music] [Applause] Dear, don't worry. And then then we're going to take you in. Don't worry. And will you you will see that someone tells my mother when are you leaving? The old car came running and I didn't see it. That's it. [Music] Driver, at the time when something happens, an accident comes in, you're more concerned with the comfort and the treatment of your patients and thinking it's dramatic. You haven't got time to be dramatic about it at all. It's just an everyday job which um you get on with. I think some people, the general public, think nurses are quite callous, but we're not. Let the doctor have a look at you and then we'll be able to see what happens. The thing with casualty work is, of course, that when somebody has an accident, it's a shock. It's a shock to the patient cuz they weren't expecting to have an accident. It's a shock to the relatives. When the relatives come up here, you have to break news. Um, be it of a death or a bad accident. This is an awful thing to have to do. You have to remain um detached from it as much as you can. Although you feel great sympathy with the relatives, you can't show your emotions to them. They're relying on you to be strong for them really so they can sort of break down, but you can't afford to. Therefore, you have to be detached to a certain degree. Not too bad. Can I help you? Oh, yes. It's quite low, isn't it? Would you like to go through and you'll be attended to straight away? Go through. This is an entirely different form of nursing from ward nursing. You're dealing strictly with the public, the mobile public really. A casualty is sort of showplace where outpatients come to that have injured themselves. Oh yeah, it's a very sore and tender. Oh yeah, it aches a lot of my finger. Well, we've cleaned up. All right. Okay. Generally um the girls do a six-month course and quite a few of them stay on after this six months time because they like the work so much. Also I think the nurses have to adjust to seeing patients in their sort of raw state when they come in after having an accident and they're probably filthy dirty and they're very distressed and sometimes when they're distressed they can be quite objectionable to you. They've got to adjust sort of mentally to this. Yeah, meditation. Oh, dear. Thank you. But an older, perhaps a more mature sister who has had outside life, outside experience, had children of her own, you find you're far more tolerant because you've been used to dealing with your own children in probably similar circumstances. [Music] I did a pre- nursing course for 3 years and um got to like it. So I went into hospital. I did um accident and orthopedic theater as a night sister for a year and then I came into the air force. I signed on for an extra year actually to do Arammed. We're not guaranteed that you'll do Arammed, but they put your name forward to the matron in chief at MOD and she decides really who's to do Aramd. You would do a year at home and you do two years abroad either Germany, Cyprus or Singapore. The only thing you do find is when you go to Singapore for instance, which is a good 18, 19 hours in the air, you're very tired and you don't take terribly kindly to the heat. But somewhere like Cyprus, which is only about 4 and 1/2 hours flying, is not, you know, bad at all really. If you've got enough initiative, when you get to the places, you take yourself out and about. You do a basic course on just flying, the procedures of flying, what you do in emergencies and things like this. How you load aircraft with your patients and what sort of complaints you put wear on the aircraft. Like somebody with a bad back, you put on a bottom stretcher. And somebody that's very ill, you obviously load into the middle of the aircraft so you can nurse all round. It's hard work. Nothing very glamorous about it. You have the satisfaction of knowing that you're obviously doing something for somebody and they're, you know, going to benefit by it. Well, I like the responsibility cuz there is a lot of responsibility and I don't mind responsibility. When I left school, I was a secretary in public relations for two years. And uh I was 19. I decided I didn't know as much about life as I could do. And uh I thought nursing training would bother my mind a bit more. And I only in fact at first intended to do the nursing training for 3 years. And then I thought I'd go back to secretarial work cuz I was enjoying it. But in fact, you know, when I done my training, I wanted to stay in nursing. When people are at their lowest end, they're totally dependent upon somebody who has the skill to be able to help them back to health. And you know, when you've got your training, you know you can do it. And um ignoring the failures that we get and sometimes they do die, but more often than not, you can get them going again. And it's a marvelous feeling when you get them up and walking. It's a long job, especially with neuro. It's a long job. sometimes takes weeks and weeks. It's lovely seeing them up and walking here. I started training in Manchester. I did three years SRN and then I did six months midwiffrey and then spent eight months in Liverpool. Four months of which I did a neurosurgical ward. And then when my husband moved down here, I I wanted to carry on doing neurosurgery. So I came here So I think of it as intensive care. Intensive care in as much as because they're unconscious, you have to turn them and clean their mouth and eyes and all this is intensive care in as much as the observations you have to do. We're looking for any change in the level of consciousness. Mainly you you assess the level at which they are whether they're deeply unconscious or whether they're only lightly whether they can be rousable to painful stimuli or whether they're completely unrazable to any sort of stimulus. And you assess this level and any change in it of course is what you're looking for. Any change for the worst you report. Excuse my fingers, Lauren. Come on. Let your lay. That's a good boy. Now, can you move your left leg for me and your right one? That's a good chance. Let me look at your eyes. Can you turn your head over? That's right. That's fine. They're going to smile for us. Put your teeth together. That's fine. What are you going You're not dated today. I don't think everybody would like it. I I think it sometimes it is depressing because the results aren't always very good obviously. And I feel that if you're only in it for a short length of time, you get a worse view of it than you're in for a long length of time because the the recovery rate is so slow that if you're only here for two months, you might see nobody recover and you get a completely different view than if you're here for a year in fact and then you start to see them come back getting better. I think this is why I think a lot of people are put off it during the training. But once they see that there are good results from neurosurgery, I think a lot more people would enjoy [Applause] it. I'm going up country this morning, Connie. If anybody wants me, I should be home about 1. Well, I think when you think of a district nurse, you always think of something like Dr. Finley's case. that sort of district now as old and on the bicycle. A lot of people don't think of us as young and toddling around in little cars. The thing that's attracted me was that I know I've got a set number of people that I must see and I know I've got a another list of people that I must see sometime during the next few days. And apart from set times of going to surgery, I can work it in myself. So my day is as long or as short as I make it. I think it's something that until you're really into it, you can't imagine really what it's like. Certainly, it was very different from what I expected it to be once I got into it. No, no, just going to surgery most mornings and a couple of nights a week. See my own patients and always have a conference with one or both of the GPS there. If there's anything special he'd like me to go and see, I go see them. I do return visits for him. Can you just bend your fingers for me? That's all right. It's not too much. Strong one. I shall tell him I'm going to fire him. I think I should think he'll just put the plaster on for you then. get you back on. I'm a staff midwife in the clinic. I started off at 16 as a cadet nurse and then I went down to the Central Middle Sex Hospital, start my general training at 18, a normal three-year training, finished at 21, qualified SRN. Then I did a year's post-graduate theater course as a staff nurse in the operating theaters. And then I went to a different hospital and did part one midwiffrey training which was 6 months. I then did part two midwifree in Bristol which is uh three months in hospital and three months in the district which was very interesting quite a change from hospital life altogether. Being a housewife and a mother, if one is happy to be that, this is fine. If you happen to be qualified and trained in another field, you feel that perhaps your presence could be spent in a more worthwhile fashion uh at work as well. You must at all cost try to avoid conflicting loyalties. Nobody is expected to attend the anti clinic at the weekends, in the evenings, or at the bank holidays. Now, this makes for a sort of happy working atmosphere in so much as that I'm not asking a person a favor by having weekends and bank holidays off, which is when my child is off from school because we all have it off. The clinic starts at 9:00 and it's very simple for me to be in the hospital by 9:00. If I start from home with half past 8, I have ample time to drive to the station for my husband to catch the 8:37 to London. Adam then goes to school, which is very convenient actually. It's quite near to the hospital. And then I'm at the hospital by about 10 to 9. 70.4. Well, that's very good as you've already done. Could you hold on to please? That's fine. Swing your leg over. Okay. Mhm. How have you been this week? Very well. Good. Have you been to see your DP? No, I haven't. Right. Yes. 32 weeks. That feels about right, doesn't it? Have you been splashing about? Okay. Yes. Good. It's still up the wrong way. Doesn't matter too much at this stage. 32 weeks. Well, perhaps if it's the wrong way around next week, we shall turn it round. Okay, nothing to worry about. Yeah, nicely. That's fine. Now, the point of these exercises is that so that when you do go into labor, all your muscles will be nice and supple already in preparation for the big day. Healthy is nothing dramatic. It's it's not really um uh treatment type nursing. A district nurse mainly does things uh treats patients, but a health visitor, it's mainly preventative. You've got to be sympathetic and a good listener and able to adapt yourself into almost any situation. Good. That's fine. Now, these exercises should be practiced at least 10 minutes in the morning on your own, then 10 minutes with your husband at night. Let him join in. Right, guys? Now, just relax. That's fine. The moms come when they're about five and a half, six months pregnant. And uh it's usually a good giggle. The moms enjoy getting together and comparing notes. And um we have lots of exercises to get the muscles in trimmed for the big day. Right. Put your hands forward on on your sheet. Okay. Good. And just raise your back just like a cat and then back down to normal again. Right. and slowly down. Good. Carry on in your own time. Good. If I'm worried about someone, I tell the general practitioners and vice versa. If if they're worried about someone, then they'll contact me. I go in each day of the surgery. We'll find this works very well. Good. Oh, that's fine. I can see you've all been practicing. Good. And relax. This afternoon, we're bathing the baby. It's a day that they all like seeing a baby being bashed cuz I think it's something which the moms are a little afraid to cope with. You know, a nice a lovely new young baby and they're a little frightened at first as to how to cope with it. [Music] I started as a pre-trainery at a convolescent home at the coast and then did three years children's nursing in staff nurse for two years in a children's hospital and then came here to do two years general was promoted sister. I've always wanted to be a nurse actually since I was about four I suppose and um then when I left school I decided it was what I wanted to do and I wanted to do basically children's nursing sick children's nursing so I went to a hospital in Brighton which did a three-year course and did the course there his wound's not healing as well as we hoped so we have to keep him in a bit longer probably children's order I general in a hospital or in a children's hospital are free and easy because to get the children to cooperate with you, you've got to have a free and easy atmosphere. If you made them all sit up like little soldiers in bed, they wouldn't do as they wanted. They're all gone. There's a little bit left. A little bit more. Lick your lips. There's a good boy. Got to be able to understand children to know what they want. They can't always tell you what they want. Mind reader really. Oh, it is. It's more exacting simply because children are always active. So therefore, as well as looking after their medical, surgical, and um nursing needs, you've got to look after the children themselves when they're up and about and tearing around and playing habit. When I first started training, I found it very very difficult. And this was one of the things which um I thought, oh now, can I really put up with this? Can I go through with nursing if I'm going to get this involved with each child? But I think after a while, you you do tend to get things a bit more in perspective and treat each child individually. There's four. He's up and about charging around. He seems to find a medical social worker who wants to see his parents totally when they come. Obviously, separation from parents and particularly their mothers at an early age sort of from 18 months upwards is quite traumatic to a young child. Whereas when they get older, they can have things explained to them and they can understand much better unless they are in in really critical condition. And then I think it's quite advisable to have the parents there as well or the mother particularly. What would I get there? I think the whole maxim for wanting to nurse is caring for people. This about for me sums it up. caring the one word. I mean, it is hard work. You can't get away from the fact it's hard work. It's hard physical work and it's hard mental work, but it's very enjoyable. I always wanted to be a nurse when I was from when I was about three. I never ever remember changing my mind. You certainly never have chance to get bored. Don't really know. It's something I've always wanted to do. I've always loved people and it's one way of helping.