NURSES' HOURS OF DUTY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 14700, 7 December 1909, Page 10

NURSES' HOURS OF DUTY.

Sin,—l have read witli great interest the communications . from Wellington and Christchurch which appeared in your issue oi yesterday regarding the proposed eighthour day for nurses. The remarks by Miss Thurston, matron of the Christchurch Hospital, appear to me to be entirely unassailable. i speak niyssli as a nurse of over 13 years' experience, during which time 1 have served in three of the largest public hospitals of the Dominion, with experience as matron of one of these institutions, In only one of the three hospitals was the eignt-'hour system in use, and there it was practically limited to probationers and night nurses, the sisteis and some of the seniors I having longer hoars. This limited application of the oight-hour system, however, left no doubt whatever in my mind as to its beini; highly undesirable, both for the nurses and the patients. ' I have no hesitation whatever in saying, as the result ol my own experience of hospitals whore the nominal hours of duty were from 10 to 12, as compared with three shifts of a rigid eight hours, that the nurses were much worse off under the shorter system. This seems so paradoxical that some explanation is needed. In order to get through the work with the necessarily limited number on duty ul any one time the eight-hour nurse is &o hard pressed and the hurryscurry is so great that she cannot give tho pationt tho personal and indivdual attention wlii:h often means so much to a sick person Say, for instance, the patient needs some passing attention, some sympathy, something that would afford iplinite relief—the loosening ci a bandage, the giving of a hot bottle, the applying oi a cold cloth to the forehead, the proper adjustment of fiillows, a soothing or encouraging word at the right moment, or any one of a dozen such little offices which a. woman tends to do instinctively,—for thsse things tho oight-hour nurse has frequently no time, though they accord with the natural prompting of Iter heart and her sense of dmy to tho patient. A specified tale oi work must be got through in n short and definite time—a fact which is almost as obvious to the patient as it is to the nurse. But both have to accept tho situation, however reluctantly,_ and the nurse placed in this false position tends to degenerate into a mere machine. It must be borne in mind she is compelled to quit the ward'at tho strike of the clock. This " hard-driving system" is as far removed from the spirit of ideal nursing as anything that one can imagine. Not only is there hard driving, but, if one may be allowed the seaming paradox, theie is ofttimes nobody to do the driving. In reality the system is tho driver, and there is next to no opportunity of learning from seniors. The sister is herself too pushed to bo able to devote time to her juniors; and there'are periods during which there is no senior in the ward—at least this was the case in my time. In the 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. day shift two meal timos came in as part of the nominal cijfht hours' duty, and it can l)e imagined what kind of justice tho nurse could do to her own health in the quarter of an hour during which she snatched her breakfast, or in the half-hour for dinner, at the end of which she must, bo back again in the ward and working at top sjiced. Wo had lectures, and were taught physiology; wo were told that there should bo a short period of rest before and after meals, and that due time must be taken over the mastication of food. Yet hero were we, a set of young womenmany of us away from home for the first time, many of lis already suffering more or less from indigestion, and some of us decidedly, anmniic,—'forced to disregrrd the injunctions of our teachers, compelled suddenly to become part of a feverish highpressure system of living . and working, such as Mi- Foster Fiuwr Wis us is such a bad fcaturo of American life. All this was done for—what? In order that we might be said to bo working under a liberal and generous eight-hour system! 1 was not, one of (he weaker nurses, having liecn used to tennis and lots of outdoor exercise, but in no period of my life have I felt so jaded and done as I did when working under the eight-hour system. My health until entering the hospital had been of the best, ami indigestion was quite unknown to me. but during my hospital life (f siieak of where the eiehthour system obtained) I laid the foundation of misery from this ailment that it took some years to recover from. There was studying to bo carried out after hours, but i teit too tired to outer on this with any spirit, ami my condition was common, more or lc:s, to the whole of us. The important iiucetiou is whether one should rogardi what 1 have bo?n tktcribing a« <• necessary result of tho stress of living and working in a hospital among the sick and l dying, or whether the weariness u.n<l lasietucl'e were due to bomg fared to live too rapidly and too intenipcratojy during the daily scurry. The better health and better spirits we enjoyed where thero were longer imurs of duty, where thero was not tlw same pressure cither in the wards or at meal hours, and where, if we happened to bo done up, those in ohargo coultt let us off for an nour or so leave no doubt whatever in my mind that, it is infinitely better for the nurse lierself to work under a reasonably olastie system—a system where much is lc-tt to tho personal regulation of tho matron and the senior mirses. Surely every competent hospital nurse would endorse what was said to your Ghristchutch correspondent by one of tho local doctors—namely that, the proper plan is to " mass tho nurses when tho ivork is heaviest, and thus ensure that every probationer will bo in tho company of a senior nurse to get. the benefit of her exViorienco," or, ni Mi.-i Thurston puts' it, "yon jmist have some elastic system of duty which will place tho maximum of assistance at disposal when it is .most needed and lighten the labours of everybody whan thero is very little to do." l'eopio who s|«ik like this know what they arc talking about. There are savcral high tides of work during tho 24 hours in every hospital, and it is at these high tides that you in'ust, have the largest number of nurses available. The skiiful matron, given three relays of nurses in the 21hours and granted, say, 10 hours' duty for her staff, can c.isilv and effectually ensure double-banking at the high tides, but this is obviously impossible under a mechanical system which makes one wt of nurses file in by the clock just as the other set files out. I heartily agree with Jliss Thurston when she says, "As i .oon as you provide trade union hours the profession of nursing ceases to be a profession, and becomes a mere trade."

I have felt very strongly (or many years that tho eight-hour system i* as bad for mirsca as it is for t ho putienls, and this opinion is certainly shared 'by a very large proportion of my professional sitters—l should say practically by all who have tho profession at heart—by all w';io6e true vocation is nursing. I have known of institutions where the nurses themselves havo asked for longer hours of duty and more time to do justice to themselves and their patients. I believe that the majority of tho nurses of the Dominion are at a 1059 to understand why it is proposed suddenly to thrust an arbitrary eight horn's on our profession. I could understand l it if this system were, necessary in older to reduce public expenditure, but clearly it would be much more expensive than what wo havo iiraanged with hitherto. As the eight-hour

system i 3 not in the interest of tho nurses, and not in the interest of hospitals, public or private, from an economic ]>oint of view., who is going to be served by the measure.' I find myself again at oira with Mies Thurston when she savs, "I cannot understand why the ci?ht-liour clausc was put into tho bill. Nobody who knows anything about hospital work could possibly want it, 9,nd we can only hopo for the 6ako of rificiency of every hcspit-u-L in tho Dominion that it will 1» withdrawn." 1 Another very great drawback, too, to the eight-hour system is that with it no whole davs off are considered nocc3sary, every day was alike in. that rcspcct. Sunday included. What would we not have given for one whole day off say once a month, or a. week every third month? Wo had jio such months' work with a fortnight's holiday at the end-this was the regulation allowance. Needless to say, a number of nurces bccame ill, and many were forced to ha given . sick leave. If nurses had been more rationally treated I think such ailments as they suffered from would never have been heard of.—l am, etc., I?X-Pll0FE3SI0XAL Nurse. Tinwrti, December 6. TROUT IX THE POMAHAKA. Sill,—ln a paragraph in your issue of the 24th inst. I see that .Mr Chisholm states that some few years ago tho trout in tho Tomahaka. were afflicted' with a diseaw similar to that affecting the trout ut Hotorua. 1 have been Citing- t.ho Pomahaka trout for many years, and lave never seen any sign of disease in them, exccpt possibly in a few wastrels, nor hare I heard of any sign of disease from any of our local anglers, of whom there must be nearly n hundred. A year or two ago the trout in tho Pomahaka. and tributaries died, not by the hundred, but by tho thousand, when the small streams "dried up; what else could they do? As a matter of fact, the creeks when dry stank with dead trout, and in pkocs tho Pomahaka was little better. In one or two places, at least, the river ceased to Row exccpt to trickle over, or through tho gravel. The l'omihaka is a snow-fed river, and as at this time there was no snow to feed it the water got too warm, and tho fish died in thousands.

IE the elutgs are the causa of the dkejsc, why arc the fish in the Pomahaka. clean and healthy now! For the sliaif is still with us. llow many shags did the society pay for last year? If the shag is so deadly why was tho head monoy reduced front 3s to Is per head? The whole cause of tho great mortality of tlio trout in those years was the scarcity of water and the 'high temperature of the river—so warm was it that fish could ouly Jive in the deeper water. Today the Pomaluka trout arc plentiful and in good condition 1 , and' big bags aro tho rule. The only worms that I know that the fish have to fear arc thoso that conceal a boo!:.—I am, c_tc., . " Pomahaka, Tapa,nui, November 24. MAORI NOMENCLATURE. . Sir,—Will you kindly print t'ho following letter, as it is a vory valuable conjirnnatiqn of my statement'! Thanking von in anticipation.—l am, etc., W. 11. S. Hoberts. District Land Office, Napier, November 19, 1900. Mr W. 11. S. Roberts. . Dear Sir, —I. have just been reading your interesting article ou " Jfa/ari Nomenclature" in the Ctago Witness of tho 3rd November. have collected so much information about the part of the country you have dealt with that I feel sure you will bo glad to hoar that I can almoet conclusively prove that Charles Cameron's statement that ho discovered Haast's Pass in January, 18G3, is correct. lam in possession of his powderfln.sk, which I took from 'the centrc of tv cairn of stones on tho top of a high anowcovered* paak to tho wc-3i of Haast's Pass 'in 1881, N'O doubt he asccndcd from the pass or thereabouts, 'as I did, and left the flask as a memento of his visit. Being whero it J V 'W, whoover put it there could not have failed to sco the pass, ns he could not have RSccna'Sd from any other direction; It waa an a very unfrequented place-in fact, until 1 aisco\-cred it I was imdor the impression that I was ihe first man who had ever visited it. The flask is half of ono of tho old powder-tins, .and has the inscription scratched on it, '' Charles Cameron. January, 186a."—Yours truly, T. K. Brodrick, Commissioner of Crown Lands and Chief Surveyor, Hawke's Bay. PROHIBITION FAILS. Sir, —At foot I copy an item of news which appears in tho Melbourne Leader, and proves tho utter failure of prohibition laws in Amcrica. It will bo the game ■wherever such \m A are enacted.—l am, ct £ . J. Wycuffe Bailie. lvoslyn, Deccmbor 5. "Groat fort-tines arc being made by express companies recently organised for t'ho carmgo of liquor from 'wet' to 4 <lrv' | cities and towns in America,, saya tlie Standard s New York correspondent. Although publiehouscs «iiid win© stores arc jiot allowed to exist in the State of Mississippi, a oitizeu lins the right to oroer whai' he requires for his own con* sumption from other Siatc.s. Several express companies arc working d-av and night delivering consignments. Reports from all pai ts point to the dismal -failure of prohibition Ja-w3. In Nashville, Tenn., a supstrict prohibition centre, the presiding judge of tlie city court remarked: 1 mvc been judge of thh court six years, J.' avc .had more' 'drunks' to deal with this month than in anv other time during mv tenure' cf office."

hydatids and THE DOG aUKAXCE. htii.-.oir.u few yeaw a#), when the Medical Coi:gre-s mot in ihinedin, Br isarnett read a papor to that asssmbly on the subject of hydatids, in which lis snowed that dags were largely responsible for the rprcad of that disuse. The Dailv limes next day published .1 leading article on the subject, proving that the dog was a source. 0! danger in connection with Ibis oread dssatc. Once tgain Dr Barnctt lug favoured the community with a very msiructive article on tho subjcct kos last 1 bur-day s Daily Times). - Now, Sir, in the face of such evidence as we havo bcfore 11s on i.his subject, I contend tlmt our tity Council should at- once take eoum steps to stop in our beautiful city this do 2 nuis,me?. ]t is nothing short of scandalous that mongrels arc i»rinittal to run about our streets upsetting cyclists, causing horses to bolt, and biting pedestrian--, hesides spreading (lisca-o. May I nsk sir, why our Health Officer do:a not take slops 10 put an end to tins nui«:racc'; ]. ur.der•sand that our laws regarding health are so striji ß ont that v,-e may not cart the ca«aso of an animal for human consumption through our tlrcah; witJiout its being covered. let this prolific source cf dteesEc is allowed to flourish in our midst! I trust. that some of our city cov-Millcrs who are fully conscious of this evil will have tho courage to move in the mutter, r.y getting a by-lav; paused prohibiting dogs from running !co:c in our etrcels, and thus earn the gratitude of all shopkeepers ar.d benefit- tho \vholo corrrpnnitv.—l n.m C '*L"' . -1- W. liIACSWOOD. Ditn;dm ; Dexmber 3.

SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS. Sir—The recent performance of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" reminds me that the first chairman of our Shakespeare Club (Mr A. Barrett) held that it should bo an acting society after gaining two years' experience on the reading platform. In the Princess Theatre he independently mounted '' Hamlet " and " Macbeth." A Shakespeare Revival Society was then formed in tho Town Hall, and among its members were Mr (now Sir) Robert Stout, Dr Belcher, and Professor Mainwaring Brown. Mr Willis (scenic artist) estimated that £700 would bo wanted for a season of "A Midsummer Night's Dream," and on my motion "Othello" was mounted, with Mr Barrett and Mr T. Broken in the leading paris. Although the Shakespeare Club (since 1877) remains for the cultivation of the art. of reading aloud, yet it was undei-slood that tho recent- acting of tho comic parts in tho former play should not be a precedent. In addition to the president (Mr Whitson), two of the recent performers (Mr Burton and myslf) had tho honour of appearing at tho club's first entertainment. It was only on condition that Mr Burton reappeared ais Bottom thtfc we gave the last entertainment.—l am, etc., \V. A. W. WATIIEN. THE TYRANNY OF LICENSE. Sin,—1 .620 that a. correspondent " Moderate " writes endorsing the views expressed by one "H. F. B." in regard to prohibition and tho alleged tyranny of it, and calling on all modej-ates to join together in defence of these alleged liberties and to keep tho liquor-selling trade alive. I do not know who "Moderate" may bo, but I do know " 11. F. 8.," and " Moderate " will perhaps bo surprised to 'learn that "H. F. B." was until lately a licensed iiquor-soller, and is probably "now directly interested in securing renewal of licenso or in staying the onward march of no-license. It is always thus. Directly anyone is seen defending liquor-selling, tho cloven foot of self-interest,, whether it be in the maintainlnP a right, to a selfish indulgence, or whether it is file monetary aspeot, invariably begins to show itself. Thus we find that "11. F. B." is financially interested or his former financial interest has warped his judgment, and that "Moderate" calm y announces thit all lovers of liberty >vill hare to leave this Dominion if colonial prohibition be carried. If this latter statement is not, as I suspect, the merest 1 bombast, it is in itself an ample proof that the sijpiafcure " Mndorato" docs not truly <{cwribo tho writer who so signs himself. Any person who.is such a slave to alcoholic JIQUOr that h© will leave the- country soojior than be deprived of it, can hardly be described as moderate. Whatever tho quantity per day such a poison is drinking, lie is rapidly fitting himself out to be aw alcoholic slave, and to be an object of pity to normally constituted people Iho one aspect of the question those writer? lose sight of is this: The tyranny of nWn S ™ 3 " 10 i? P ronollno «l and inexcusrvdi?,i \i a " • i yranny of P r °hibition. Cardinal Manning ha 9 said, in effect, and Fithe, 3 !-? l uoted . to .™e with approval by . hoi Hays when in New Zealand: "Theiv u-hiS t i' rfl s ly 60 dreadful as that tyranny which masts, oa placing- before all and

sundry a temptation which a large section of the people aro unablo successfully to resist, and which, if yielded to, destroys and utterly blasts tho wholo family life of the victim, cutscs tho wholo existence of innocent women and children, destroys good citixori3, manufactures criminals, nntl in every way is u menace to tho wholo people. Nothing "ciiii oxcuso in tho eyes of God theso who insist, for their own selQsh convonienco in placing this temptation beforo their weaker brethren." The abovo is a summing up which cannot bo wrigglod out of. Tho inothens and fathers vote 110iicenso to save their eons and daughters from tomptaition, the friend to eavo lias friend, tho wife her husband and tho husband tho wife. The selfish voters for continuance eiy, "You uhall not savo your friend, your husband, your wife, your child; I insist that, lor my convenience and to gratify my appetite, your dear ones shall l» tempted, I do not caro for them: I only oaro for myself and my drink," An atiraotivo picture, is it not?—l am, etc., Secretary No-license Pakti.