Subsidiary Notes as to the Introduction of Female Nursing into Military Hospitals in Peace and WarNightingale, Florence
History
Subsidiary Notes as to the Introduction of Female Nursing into Military Hospitals in Peace and War
Nightingale, Florence
Military hospitals -- Great Britain; Nurses -- Great Britain
[Sidenote: Encumbrance of Public Support or Patronage.]
19. It appears to me most important to be free, once and for ever, from
the injurious, untrue, and derogatory appendage of public patronage:
what is called support in these days always ends in patronage. This
work, truly understood, never has been, never will be, never can be, a
popular work; for many reasons, one of which is that the public, of all
orders, never can know anything of the real nature of hospital-work.
With the best intentions, it will therefore make perpetual and impeding
mistakes in “supporting” or patronizing it. Its support and patronage
are equally injurious in different ways as regards our masters the
medical men, ourselves the nurses, and people who are neither medical
men nor nurses.
[Sidenote: Caution, Non-expectation, and Trust.]
20. I end as I began. Let nothing be done rashly. Let us not be
fettered with many rules at first. Let us take time to see how things
work; what is found to answer best; how the work proceeds; how far it
pleases God to accept and bless it. Let us be prepared, as I know well
we must be, for disappointments of every sort and kind. What can any of
us do in anything, what are any of us meant to do in anything, but our
duty, leaving the event to God? His Will be done in earth, as it is in
Heaven.
II. NURSES IN CIVIL HOSPITALS.
[Sidenote: Isolation of each Head Nurse and her Nurses.]
1. The isolation of each head-nurse and her nurses appears to me very
important. The head-nurse should be within reach and view of her
ward both day and night. Associating the nurses in large dormitories
tends to corrupt the good, and make the bad worse. Small airy rooms
contiguous to the ward are best. The ward should have but one entrance,
and the head-nurse’s room should be close to it, so that neither
nurse nor patient can leave, nor any one enter the ward, without her
knowledge.
[Sidenote: All to Rank and be Paid alike, with Progressive Increase of
Wages.]
2. All the nurses should rank and be paid alike, with progressive
increase of wages after each ten years’ good service, or a slow annual
rise, which is better.
[Sidenote: Night Nurses.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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