THE NURSES SEND AN SOS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 11, Issue 274, 22 September 1944, Page 21

THE NURSES SEND AN SOS

~ ANTED-2000 recruits! That is the number of new nurses New Zealand requires each year to meet its hospital needs. But although many more girls are now choosing nursing as their vocation, there are still not enough, so throughout the Dominion, nurses are launching an appeal. Those who have made it their career, say that it is the finest profession a woman can take up, and, after all, they are the ones who ‘know. They have -to work hard — yes. But ask any one of them and she will tell you she wouldn’t give it up for anything. And one of the reasons they have to work so hard is that there is such a shortage of trainees. Wartime demands have called many to overseas work; hospitals have been expanded and new ones built; and the numbers of wounded men returning and requiring treatment has placed an added burden on_ the’. already overworked staffs. And there is a large proportion of married nurses who will be leaving the service when their husbands return after the war. In spite of this, there are now approximately twice as mafy -murses in New Zealand as there were five years ago, but with the increased health services the needs are more than twice as great. Earlier this year, the Nursing Division of the Health Department, supported. by the Government, held its first campaign for nurses since the outbreak of war. It was very successful, and this time the local hospitals will again co-operate with the central department. Many girls who would normally have entered the nursing profession have responded to the call for women for the forces. What will these girls do when they receive their discharge at the end of hostilities, or even earlier? The nurses want them to transfer to the hospitals, and so, during the approaching campaign in Wellington, some will be visiting the Wrens, Waacs and Waafs to make their appeal personally, to tell them of the desperate need, of the value and interest of the work, and of the fact that many trained nurses cannot be released for further specialised training as there are not enough to fill their places. Visits will also be paid to girls’ secondary schools to urge the importance of starting a definite career immediately they leave school, and to point out the net advantages of the nursing profes-sion-facts frequently overlooked by girls when considering the merits of different careers. For this purpose figures will be prepared illustrating the point that nurses are not poorly paid, when compared with typists, etc.-not when such items as board and uniforms are taken into account. In some districts "Hospital Saturdays" are going to be conducted, when secondary schoolgirls will be shown over the hospitals, and will see the nurses at work. They will have explained to them the opportunities for travel that are open to New Zealand nurses, who have no difficulty in getting a position anywhere in the world, so highly-rated is our nursing standard, and also the varied courses such as maternity, Plunket, and so on, that can be undertaken after the general training. The national campaign will begin ag Sh October. [ pictures tell their own story. They show nurses off duty as well as on duty, with pak with soldiers, and in a women’s ward.