TRAINING OF NURSES

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 145, 23 June 1930, Page 8

TRAINING OF NURSES

(To the Editor.)

Sir,—The only thing wrong with "N.Z.R.N.," as delineated by her letter in last Friday's "Post," is that she says too much for the benefit of her case. She is proud of her "horse sense,'' which she rates above mere braininess; and in that she may be right. But what is the matter with the atmosphere of a private hospital, which is also a training-school, that would force it to sacrifice a student nurse

on the altar of less useful brains, at th« expense of more helpful horse-sense? We are told that an English sister said to "N.Z.R.N.": "It's really no wonder you New Zealand nurses are in such demand everywhere; you are so comprehensively trained, and so full of. common sense." Now, the whole of tha» Nurses' AssociaV tiou's plea for the retention of the present reciprocal admission of English and New Zealand nurses is based on the association's claim that the continuance of that reciprocity is determined on New Zealand's keeping up to the present English standard of nursing. If these English, sisters lack comprehensive training and common sense, as "N.Z.R.N." implies, what of her vaunted standard here? And, the hollow-ness of the reciprocity argument is shown by the fact that, by virtue of the English Nurses' Registration Act, once New" Zealand refused to admit these allegedly partially-trained and lacking-in-common sense English sisters, no NewZealand nui-Ee need apply for registration in England, for she would be refused. I suppose we should be grateful for th« detailed statement made by "N.Z.R.N." of the incidents of training in our publio hospital training-schools. It is interesting, but wholly superfluous in this discussion. No one has yet said that the approved private hospitals will not have |to comply in every detail wlith the sam» training programme. "And lastly," says "N.Z.R.N.," "what about the present happy relations in our hospitals, where nurses of all creeds and denominations share the same hospital chapel, each nurse tolerating and respecting every other creed?" As I have already remarked, she says too much for her case. She implies, in the sentence just quoted, that if any private hospital were approved as a training-school either (1) she knows that "the present happy relations" ■in our public hospital training-schools will I be a thing of the past, or (2) she fears that there will bo no "happy relations" among the student nurses in the private trainingschools.' But, apart from that, will "N.Z.R.N." tell us just what, "creed or denomination" has to do with the quality or standard of nursing, or the ability .of nurses to train properly? That is what we are discussing. If the Bill is passed, why should any nurse, ipso facto, cease to tolerate and respect any other creed? Do> the qualified nurses look to the creed o£ patients before accepting those patient** fees?T-I am, etc., ■ • ■ , SCIRON.