Nurse scheme ‘brilliant’

Press, 26 January 1984, Page 7

Nurse scheme ‘brilliant’

Doubts cast on the prac-tice-nurse scheme have been rejected by Dr Selwyn Carson, president of the Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners. The Nurses’ Society wants the Health Department to review the role and use of Government-paid practice nurses. Its national director, Mr David Wills, said the skills of many practice nurses were poorly used. Dissatisfaction was causing many to return to other types of

nursing work. Dr Carson, a Christchurch general practitioner, said the college would welcome research on the role of practice nurses and all nurses in the community. However, he said the scheme had been “brilliant” over all. “It is the thing that has kept general practice going,” he said. There would always be some doctors who did not use practice nurses properly.

“But I think Mr Wills really does not know how well they and practice nurses are working together,” Dr Carson said. Many nurses, employed by practices through the scheme, had been in the job for years. Mr Wills said yesterday he was hopeful that the Minister of Health, Mr Malcolm, would agree to the review. Otherwise the society would consider doing the research itself.