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
In a great London Civil Hospital, St. Thomas’s, it is the very
admirable practice for each patient (of course with necessary
exceptions) to be bathed on his or her admission. The Sisters are
responsible for examining each woman in the bath, which is within the
female wards, and for at once reporting before suffering them to go to
bed, any case of suspected pregnancy, syphilis, or contagious disease.
A man does the same for the men, who are bathed apart from the wards.
This arrangement is an excellent one. On the other hand, severe cases,
just able to be carried to baths, get no good by going through the air,
and being jolted up and down stairs.
In planning a Military Hospital, in which the service of women is to
be introduced, it is important to obtain the advice of experienced
Army Surgeons as to the arrangement of appurtenances of the wards to
be used by the patients alone. Endeavour to prevent the system of
holes and corners. It is best that the Nurse’s door should command the
view of those who come in or out of the lavatory, and in or out of the
water-closet. This whole section is both ugly and important.
[Sidenote: 11. Summary.]
11. To sum up. I think it would work the best to have no store-closet,
only two well-appointed presses, by which a certain amount of cleaning
is saved, and a corner avoided.
Could two cupboards or presses in the wall be arranged for the ward
linen and the ward stores, it would be preferable to presses placed
against the walls. Take care, however, that the wall is sufficiently
thick, so that the presses are not damp, and if this cannot be provided
against, keep to presses separate from the wall.
Believe that all this is neither theory nor fidget--but practice.
The furthest end of the ward should contain a lavatory, a water-closet,
and the pierced basin for emptying and cleaning bed-pans is a very
useful thing. At the other end of the ward, the Nurse’s little room,
her door opening full upon the ward. If the upper half were of glass,
with a curtain before it, allowing the Nurse to see the ward without
being seen, it would be all the more useful. At St. Thomas’s, a window
opens into the ward, the Sister drawing a blind when she chooses, and a
door opens into the passage, just within the ward doors, opposite the
scullery, so that the Sister enters the scullery, in which there is
a water-closet, for the accommodation of herself and Nurses, without
traversing her ward. Whether door or window, the Nurse should see at
once all that is going on in her ward. I prefer a door; yet, if there
is to be a ward for one, it may be best and most central to have the
Nurse’s window on the large ward, and her door open on the passage.
Opposite the Nurse’s room should be a scullery, not too small. The
scullery should be well provided with cold, and, if possible, warm
water.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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