NURSING FAILS TO ATTRACT GIRLS

Grey River Argus, 10 April 1948, Page 7

NURSING FAILS TO ATTRACT GIRLS

DUNEDIN, April 9 A recent survey showed that 400 fewer girls entered the nursing training in 194'7 than in 1945. said Miss M. I. Lambie, director of the Division of Nursing in the Department of Health, at the conference of the New Zealand Registered Nurses’ Association in Dunedin. The decrease was principally in the 20-year age group. To bridge the gap for schoolgirls, the Nurses’ and Midwives’ Board with the Education Department, had inaugurated a pre-nursing course which was begun last year. The Nurses’ and Midwives’ Board had consistently advocated the extension of block or day study systems of teaching to give more emphasis to the student aspect of training. Miss H. D. Grey, matron of the Royal Melbourne Hospital, said a survey had revealed a shortage of nurses in Victoria at the end of 3.946 of 750 trained nurses and 600 stud’ent curses and a similar position at the end of 1947. In spite of this the figures showed that more nurses gratuated each year. The shortage was attributed, as in New Zealand, to the greater demands .of hospitals, marriage and the competition of other qareers now onen to girls. The means employed to 'recruit girls to nursing were similar to those used in New Zealand. Improved facilities for use of District Health Nurses, when treating and examining school children, were urged in a remit carried. The matter will be referred to the Education Department. One delegate said that in her district an open draughty sheltershed was the only accommodation available. Officers elected were:—President, Miss N. P. Fitzgibbon '(Otago); Dominion Executive: Misses V. Hammond (Auckland), N. Knight (Wellington), L. A. Hill (Waikato), I. M. Henderson (Manawatu), Widdowson (Canterbury), and N. P. Fitzgerald (Otago). The 1949 conference of the Association will be held at Napier.