Yes Sister, No Sister Read online

  ‘Congratulations,’ I say. ‘Let us raise our coffee cups to toast my new perm.’

  Dave says, ‘What are you keeping all these boxes of chocolates for? Can’t we open one?’

  He is referring to a pile of 10 or 20 pound chocolate boxes that is growing as Christmas approaches. It is a Yorkshire custom for patients and ex-patients to express their thanks with chocolates, especially at Christmas.

  ‘They’re for Christmas but we could open one as part of Brenda’s celebration.’ I open a box of Black Magic and pass it round. ‘You know, it’s not fair, none of the other departments get chocolates and they do as much for patients as we do. I’m going to send them around.’

  I write little cards saying, ‘With many thanks for your services from Ward 1’, attach one to a box of chocolates and send a box to the porters, kitchen, dispensary, physio and the Lady Almoner’s office, which, among other duties, assigns convalescent beds at the Ida. Little do I realise at the time the effect this gesture will have.

  Whenever we need a porter, one appears in an instant; we receive special extras with the food, like apples; when we need an Ida bed for a patient we are allocated one faster than any other ward; and I’m invited to the pharmacy Christmas party.

  ‘I have discovered what an expression of appreciation can do,’ I say to Joan. ‘I must try to do it more often. I’ll start by saying how glad I am that you’re on my ward.’

  ‘I like working with you too,’ she says. ‘Even though you’re as daft as a brush.’

  She and I spend an afternoon shopping for toiletries for our patients’ Christmas presents. We use a fund of donations from patients over the year and supplement it with our own money. The chemist across the road from the hospital gives us a discount so we are able to buy some really nice gifts.

  We decide to decorate the ward as a circus. Joan brings in her bike, which we stand on the central table, and above it we suspend a stuffed figure with its arms on the handlebars and its legs in the air. Brenda is surprisingly artistic and she and some patients paint clown faces on large pieces of cardboard. We attach these to each junction of the curtain rails so the effect is that of a row of clowns looking down on us.

  We remove a bed and its curtains and enclose the space with half-inch wide strips of aluminium foil so that it resembles a cage. Dave fashions two extraordinary bird-like creatures from plaster of Paris, one larger than the other. We sit these in straw behind the foil with a big label, ‘Pneumosaurus and chick.’

  Leeds City supplies each ward with a 15-foot tree and porters set these up in the middle of the ward. Needless to say, our ward is the first. Porters also hang decorations near the top of the tree while the step-ladder is available.

  Many patients go home for Christmas but we are left with about 12. We bring their beds up to the front of the ward. We leave one really sick woman further down where it is more peaceful.

  I am expecting the Salvation Army band to play carols on Christmas Eve but I am not prepared for so many musicians with their silver instruments. I fear that they will deafen the patients but when they raise their trumpets, trombones and tubas to their mouths, the sound is so sweet that it brings tears to everyone’s eyes.

  Although I am exhausted from staying up late every night for pantomime rehearsals, I eagerly go on duty on Christmas Day. The patients have opened their stockings and are ready for a special breakfast of bacon, eggs, mushrooms and black pudding. Visitors are welcome from 10am on and in the afternoon we serve them tea and fruit cake. The highlight of the day is the carving of the turkey by Dr Hartman in a white chef’s hat. He makes quite a display of sharpening the knife before he carves with a flourish, giving a running commentary on the anatomy of a bird. His family is also here to help serve the meal.

  After we have cleared up and the patients settle down for a nap, I go to the dining room where I wait on the student nurses. Then it is the sisters’ turn and the housemen wait on us. Matron and her assistants eat with us. After the Christmas pudding Matron stands up to present the cup for the best decorated ward.

  ‘We had a hard time deciding this year as there are so many clever and original themes. I must say that my sisters take a great deal of trouble with their decorations and you are all to be congratulated. After much deliberation we decided to award the cup to Ward 1. Sister Ross, would you come up please.’

  To the sound of applause, I go up to the head table to receive the silver cup, which I will display in the ward until next Christmas. I return with it and jubilantly carry it round to show the patients. Then I place it on top of the DDA cupboard. Joan and Brenda are as thrilled as I am and we do a little dance in the sideward.

  We have been rehearsing for the pantomime every night after nine o’clock and those of us who live out are allowed to stay in the Nurses’ Home during this time. Sandy and I are in the sisters’ wing. I am enjoying being woken with a cup of tea each morning and putting my shoes outside my door to be cleaned. Despite these luxuries, I would not want to live in permanently as one never seems to be off duty.

  We put on two performances of the pantomime, which, as usual, goes down a treat. We have collected anecdotes over the year and these have been translated into the script or a song. One registrar, Michael Todd, was running a rectal outpatient clinic one day. He went out to the waiting room to call for his next patient, a Mrs Murphy, who dutifully entered his examining room. He asked her to take off everything below the waist and lie on the table. She looked puzzled but didn’t say anything until he had gloves on and was ready to examine her rectum prior to doing a sigmoidoscopy.

  At this point she sat up and said, ‘But Doctor, it’s me ears I’ve come with.’ It seems there were two Mrs Murphys in outpatients that day. Michael was not allowed to forget it though, as our verse in the registrar’s song, to the tune of ‘John Brown’s Body’ was:

  You must all beware when Michael Todd is on the prowl,

  His faux pas down in Outpatient’s Department was a howl,

  For in the rectal clinic they’ve a brand new therapy,

  For pains in the ears, it’s sigmoidoscopy.

  A new decade. 1960 dawns. Every day I wake up eager to go to work. When I get there, I am soon buoyed up by the enthusiasm of my staff nurses and students who are all so willing to work hard and stay late if necessary. On my weekends off I enjoy walking in the Dales with Sandy. We frequently take two days over a hike and stay the night in a youth hostel.

  Yes, my life is good.

  Chapter 28

  MY RELATIONS WITH Matron and her office are not always cordial. I think they believe that if there is nothing negative to say, then all is well. Whenever the tall, thin figure of Ann Wilks appears, my stomach knots and I feel as though I am a schoolgirl instead of a State Registered Nurse in charge of a ward of 34 patients.

  One day she appears as we are serving dinner. I leave the trolley and greet her at the door. She stands at the foot of each bed while I recite the patient’s name, diagnosis, treatment and progress. She makes no comment to me but asks each patient how she is. ‘Nicely thank you,’ or ‘A bit poorly today,’ are the regular answers. In a bed at the end of the ward is a lively, toothless octogenarian, Mrs Daley, and I see, to my horror, that she is trying to eat a slice of roast beef. In the next bed, a patient on a normal diet is eating mince. Clearly the trays have been mixed up.

  ‘Why is this patient sucking on a slice of beef, Sister, when she obviously cannot chew?’

  I know that Mrs Daley is stone deaf so I say to Matron, ‘She is so tired of mince that she asked for roast beef today so she could suck on it. Isn’t that right, Mrs Daley?’ I say, nodding at her.

  ‘Aye, aye,’ she says, nodding back, and I bless her cotton socks.

  On a fairly regular basis, the office sends for me, sometimes to see Matron and sometimes to see Miss Darcy, her deputy. We are expected to stand in front of Matron’s desk as she sits and I wish I had BB’s courage to pull up a chair and sit down. I don’t, so I stand there l
ike a naughty school-girl.

  A PTS nurse is on the ward one morning for a few hours experience. Shortly after the patient’s dinner we have a blood transfusion to start. I ask her if she’d like to watch and help. ‘Ooh yes, Sister’ she says, her eyes lighting up. I can remember how I felt at that stage when everything is so new and exciting. Dave is starting the transfusion and I prepare the trolley.

  ‘While the doctor is washing his hands,’ I say firmly, looking at Dave, ‘We check that the blood is the right type.’

  As there is no movement of Dave towards the sink, I say again, ‘While the doctor is washing his hands…’

  ‘Oh right,’ Dave says and moves to the sink.

  I supervise the procedure for a while and then leave them. At 1.30 I go behind the curtains and say to the PTS nurse, ‘It’s time you went for your dinner. Thank you. I’ll take over now.’

  ‘Oh Sister’ she says. ‘We’ve nearly finished and I don’t mind being late for dinner.’

  ‘We’ll be about five minutes,’ Dave says.

  ‘Alright then,’ I say. I forget about the incident until the call to Matron’s office.

  ‘Sister Ross,’ she says as I stand before her. ‘I understand a PTS nurse came in late for her dinner the other day. I must point out that these probationers are sent to the wards for very basic experience and are NOT to be used as staff.’

  I imagine that the nurse had gone to the dining room to crow to her friends about helping with a blood transfusion. Her story must have reached the ears of Up and Down, who reported the event to Matron.

  ‘I wished to excite her by letting her attend the start of a blood transfusion.’ I say. ‘I asked her to go to her dinner but she chose to stay until the procedure was finished.’

  ‘Well Sister, this must not happen again. As I said, PTS nurses are not there to replace staff.’

  I am furious and stomp back to my ward. Despite all that I have initiated, there has been no word of encouragement and now I’m told off for making a student late.

  An ex-LGI nurse is admitted as a patient for neurological tests. One morning she has to go across the road to the School of Dentistry. We are extremely busy, as we are one nurse short, so I send for a porter with a wheelchair to transport her there. I make sure she is well wrapped up before sending her on her way. After she is discharged, I am summoned to the office.

  ‘I have had a letter from Miss Gold,’ Matron says. ‘She complains that she was sent over to the School of Dentistry without a nurse accompanying her.’

  ‘She didn’t need a nurse to accompany her. She was up and about, not ill, and we were extremely busy.’

  ‘She is an ex-LGI nurse, Sister, as I think you know.’

  ‘Does that mean I was supposed to neglect 33 other patients by losing a nurse for the whole morning?’

  ‘No, but…’

  ‘You are calling my judgement into question. I’m sorry but I think the welfare of 33 patients takes precedence over one, even if she is an ex-nurse.’ I turn on my heel and march out.

  I notice one day that Ward 11 has new ward doors with an attractive stained-glass declaration that this is Ward 11. My doors do not close properly. They swing on their hinges smoothly but when they close, there is a gap between them. I write a requisition: ‘One pair of new ward doors.’

  Miss Darcy sends for me, shows me the requisition and says, ‘You can’t just order a pair of doors!’

  ‘Why not?’ I say. ‘Mine don’t close properly.’

  ‘Yes, but although you can order supplies, you can’t order things like doors.’

  ‘Why not?’ I say again. ‘Ward 11 has just got new doors.’

  ‘So that’s it. Doors are extremely expensive. The House Committee must order that sort of thing. Ward 11’s doors were rotten, had come off their hinges and were completely dysfunctional. Yours are not. She laughs. ‘You must learn to live with them, Sister Ross.’

  Although Sundays are quiet, we have all the student nurses on duty. The next time I work out the off duty, I give a student a Saturday afternoon and Sunday off. She is delighted as students only get weekends off during block. After that I make a habit of giving each student, in turn, a weekend. Not for long.

  Miss Darcy says, ‘Matron has asked me to talk to you about your off duty allocation. We have learned that you are giving students weekends off.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘It doesn’t make sense to have everyone working on a Sunday when the ward is quieter than any other day.’

  ‘Well, I’m afraid this practice must stop. Students may not be off on the weekend.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘You are creating a precedent. If they get weekends on your ward, they’ll want to know why they can’t have the same on every ward.’

  ‘Well, why shouldn’t they? Why can’t I be the one to set an example?’ I try not to sound as frustrated as I feel.

  ‘Other sisters have complained.’ Miss Darcy looks embarrassed.

  ‘So even if it doesn’t suit my ward work and I am short on a Tuesday, for example, I can’t give a student a Saturday afternoon and Sunday off?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  I tell Joan and Brenda about this latest edict. ‘It’s ridiculous. I expect it’s the Dragon. She’d rather be short all week than allow a student to be off at the weekend.’ I show my annoyance by stabbing the TPR book with my pen. ‘All right, I’ll give them a half-day on Friday, Saturday and a morning till one on Sunday. Not as good, but at least they get a Saturday night and a lie-in the next day.’

  I do get a compliment eventually, back-handed though it is. Miss Darcy comes on the ward to see me, rather than summoning me to the office.

  ‘I am sending you a Nurse Sinclair,’ she says. ‘She’s in second year and wants to hand in her notice. She’s fed up she says. She has agreed to a trial of three months so I have decided to put her here so you can inspire her. I know how much the nurses love working here.’

  After that I regularly get disaffected nurses on my roster. All they need is encouragement and some effort to make the work interesting for them, especially in second year when they seem to hit a period of disenchantment.

  In addition to rounds by the office, Sister Tutors occasionally visit. One day, much to my surprise, AJ appears. She stands at the door smiling and asks me if she may do a round. ‘Don’t bother to put on your cuffs, Sister.’

  We walk slowly round the ward but AJ does not seem interested in the patients as she does not want to hear their diagnoses. ‘I hear your students each have a case to study and write up. May I see one of them?’ Ah, so that’s why she’s here.

  I proudly show her a student’s notes about a patient with leukaemia. The student has taken great pains to investigate the condition and even quotes the latest research reported in The Lancet.

  ‘Hmm,’ is all AJ says.

  ‘Can’t you think of anything positive to say,’ I think. I suddenly feel disheartened and carry on with the round in a dispirited way. We reach a patient with a Ryle’s tube.

  AJ looks at me and starts to laugh. ‘Do you remember when you put one of those down yourself? I don’t know how I kept a straight face! That was one of the funniest sights I’d seen for a long time.’ Her laughter turns to wheezing so she has to take out a handkerchief to wipe her eyes.

  I do win a major battle with the office, largely because Hugh Dingwall takes a stand. A third-year nurse, close to finals, is admitted because she has had several episodes of brief periods of unconsciousness. After a number of tests she is told she has Petit Mal and is given a drug to control it. When the office finds out, she is told she cannot continue her training and that she may not be a nurse. I make an appointment to see Matron.

  ‘Nurse Weller, as you know, has been diagnosed with Petit Mal. As you also know, there is a great deal of ignorance about epilepsy. The sufferers can live a normal life; they just have to be careful doing certain things, like driving a car.’

  ‘It is impossible for an epilept
ic to be a nurse, Sister. We must think of the patients.’

  ‘Yes, I know, but there are many places she could work where she does not put patients in danger. Out-patients for example.’ I am trying to keep calm.

  ‘It is out of the question, Sister. Nurse Weller will have to find another, more suitable career.’ Matron turns to her paper work in a dismissive gesture.

  Next time Dr Dingwall comes on the ward, I tell him about the incident.

  ‘We’ll see about that,’ he says. ‘It’s appalling the way epileptics are treated. I don’t know why we don’t lock them behind bars and have Sunday outings to go and stare at them.’

  I hear nothing more until Nurse Weller visits the ward, in uniform.

  ‘I am to finish my training after all. I only have three months to go and I’m spending it in out-patients.’ She looks as if she wants to give me a hug. ‘I’m so grateful that you went to bat for me. I can’t see any reason why I can’t go on. After all I’ve been like this for two years and I didn’t harm anyone. Now I’m on drugs, my fits are controlled, so I shall be even less of a danger.’

  Chapter 29

  EACH YEAR, TO inform us of new developments in nursing, the sisters are taken off their wards for two ‘study days’. These days give us a chance to sit back and reflect on what we are doing. They are held in the Nurses’ Home in the same room where the Sod first addressed us. We wear mufti. There is a general carnival atmosphere until the topic of the day is explained: we are to know what to do in the event of a nuclear war.

  Sandy and I sit next to each other to hear about how we are to move our patients, beds and bedding to tents beside the River Wharfe. We are to spend part of this day making a list of everything we will need.