PROTECTION OF NURSES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16376, 2 November 1916, Page 6

PROTECTION OF NURSES

DANGER FROM TYPHOID.

INOCULATION PROPOSED.

CONDITION OF EMPLOYMENT.

The question of the protection of nurses against the danger of infection by patients in the hospital came before the Hospital Board last evening in connection with a report presented*, by the Medical Committee and supplemented by comments from the medical superintendent, Dr. Maguire. The Medical Committee expressed its opinion that "it is a most inadvisable and dangerous practice to employ nurses in wards either wholly, or partly, reserved for the treatment of infectious or contagious diseases, unless such nurses have completed their first year's training." To this Dr. Maguire replied lhat if the committee's resolution were r auctioned by the board it might mean that practically all the wards would have to be closed to nurses in their first year. In the majority of the wards there generally were infectious or contagious diseases of one kind or another. The infectious or contagious diseases commonly treated in the hospital were scarlet fever, diphtheria, typhoid fever, measles, pneumonia, influenza, and septicemia. The difficulty would be, should such a rule become absolute, to know how and where the firstyeai nurses could receive their training, as, for example, were a case of pneumonia in a ward, that ward could be classed as partly reserved for the treatment of pneumonia, which was an infectious disease..

Another part of the Medical Committee's resolution dealt with protective inoculation and vaccination against infectious disease. On this point Dr. Maguire observed that vaccination against smallpox was now compulsory for nurses before entering upon their training. In his opinion inoculation against typhoid fever should be made compulsory also, as a condition precedent of appointment. Telegrams were received from other hospital boards, in answer to inquiries as to their practice in regard to the employment of first-year nurses in infectious'disease wards. In all cases it was ascertained that probationers were generally so employed, with the exception of the Wellington hospital, where probationers are onlv allowed in fever wards in emergencies.

The chairman (Mr. M. J. Coyle) said a probationer nurse was not employed in any ward of the Auckland hospital," wtiich was wholly used for infectious complaints. Where she was employed in a general ward that contained such cases, she was not required to give attention to the infectious cases. When epidemics prevailed and a large number of infectious cases were in one ward, probationers were not allowed into that ward. Mr. A. Hall Slcelton thought that, in view of the experiences in the present war as to the utility of inoculation against typhoid, the inoculation of the board's nurses should be strongly insisted upon. He moved that the medical superintendent's report he adopted as regards future nurses, and that the Finance and Legal Committee be requested to draw up regulations providing for inoculation of the nurses in general.

This course was adopted.