Trouble at Dunedin Hospital

Kai Tiaki : the journal of the nurses of New Zealand, Volume IV, Issue 1, 1 January 1911, Page 19

Trouble at Dunedin Hospital

The deeply regrettable circumstances which led to the resignation of Miss Fraser. the Matron for nearly twenty years of the Dunedin Hospital have been so much discussed m the daily papers of Otago that we need only give a brief outline here. The circumstances were as follows :—During the absence on leave of the medical superintendent a letter was published m the ' Otago Daily Times ): bringing charges against the hospital and its administration as regards the nurses, which m their main points were absolutely false, and m others much exaggerated.

The matron took a cruel insinuation — that leave to visit dying relatives was denied to the nurses — so much to heart that she resigned.

It was unknown who was the writer of the letter ; but contrary to all proper hospital discipline, a junior resident doctor sent a newspaper reporter to a ward m the hospital, practically authorising him (although his own authority was not sufficient to give him the power to do so) to obtain from a certain nurse information which he himself said he refused to give. The nurse, forgetting her obligation towards the hospital m which she had obtained her certificate, and her obligation also towards the matron who on a previous occasion had treated her with too great leniency and kindness, confirmed the statements m the letter, and added further complaints.

On the return of the medical superintendent this nurse was suspended from duty pending inquiries into her action by the Board. It was proposed by the Board to ask the Minister m charge of Hospitals to hold a magisterial inquiry, with the assistance of the Inspector-General of Hospitals. Before, however, this request was formally made the Inspector-General considering from his intimate knowledge of the Dunedin Hospital, and his appreciation of the work of the matron and medical superintendent, that there could not possibly be much that was seriously amiss m their administration ; and also that most of the complaints were such that they could be better dealt with by a trained nurse, deputed his assistant (Miss Maclean) to hold an inquiry into all the

matters, and generally, into the whole of the nursing and domestic administration.

The Board were glad to accept his intervention, recognising themselves that there should be no need for a public inquiry, and offered every facility to Miss Maclean m her inquiry.

The press, no doubt annoyed at this action, as discounting the value and importance of its sensational disclosures, was not satisfied, and described the action of the Department as " white- washing/ and predicted a very rne-sided judgment.

The Assistant Inspector conducted an inquiry lasting some days, during which she interviewed privately, and took evidence from nearly the whole of the staff of the hospital. On this she reported to the Inspector-General, who thereupon forwarded her report to the Board with some comments and recommendations.

Without going into details now, we may say that, as was to be expected, when each nurse was invited to give her evidence under the seal of confidence to one of her own sex and calling, many small matters came out which, without any one of them being great m itself, yet called for rectification, and the nurses themselves acknowledged that if they had mentioned these matters before it is probable they would have been so rectified. In fact, many of them had been put before the medical superintendent and matron and steps had been already taken to do so.

The allegations which had so distressed the matron were absolutely denied by the nurses, and they were, almost without exception'entirely loyal to her, and truly grieved at her loss and at the discredit bxought upon their training school.

One matter which had been complained about was the food ; not so much the food itself, which was of the best quality, but of its cooking and serving. This as we all know, is one of the chief difficulties of a hospital matron's administration, and we would refer our readers (especially all hospital matrons) to the report m the " Nursing Times " of 12th November, 1910 ; and the paper read by the matron of the General Hospital, Birmingham at a recent conference,

on " The Feeding of Nurses," organised by the National Food Reform Association.

In many points, especially with regard to the fare provided for resident doctors, the report furnished by Miss Maclean is similar m its views to those expressed by Miss Musson. The improvements needed m this respect were already under consideration by the committee, which had appointed recently a house steward of experience m cooking and dieting.

On the report furnished by Miss Maclean the Inspector-General had recommended that the services of the nurse who had so failed m loyalty to the hospital should be dispensed with ; and that the doctor responsible for the reporter's visit to her ward should be severely reprimanded, and on the conclusion of the term (m three months time) for which he was appointed, should leave the hospital. The report and recommendations were published and great pressure was brought to bear on the Board by the press not to act upon the advice of the InspectorGeneral. After long discussion the matter was finally settled by the Board accepting the apology of the doctor, and re-instating the nurse.

The troubles of the Board were not yet ended. As we go to press we see that the Sisters are not satisfied ; that this nurse who brought about the undeserved scandal m connection with the hospital should be so re-instated, and have written to say that they desired to place on record —

That they deeply deplored that their minor grievances had been unwarrantably magnified into the nature of a hospital scandal, for which there was no justification. They had every confidence m the hospital committee making any readjustments which must necessarily arise from time to time m a professional m

stitution. They wished to point out that the greatest grief had been caused to Miss Fraser by a certain statement which had appeared m the " Otago Daily Times," and which was supported later by Nurse Woodward, and was proved by Miss Maclean to be a cruel and false insinuation against the matron — an opinion m which they all concurred. They would like to know if this statement had been withdrawn by Miss Woodward prior to her re-instatement, as they intended to write to her asking her to apologise to Miss Fraser.

Later again we hear that Nurse Woodward had sent her resignation to the Board, and it had been accepted.

In accepting the resignation of Miss Fraser (who had already been granted six months leave of absence on full pay), which was not done without having given her ample time for reconsidering her determination, the chairman of the committee moved :

That this Board desires to place on record its sincere regret at the resignation of Miss Fraser as Matron of the Dunedin Hospital, and the reasons prompting it, after her many years of honourable and faithful service ; and that the committee report to the next meeting as to the best means of making some suitable and permanent recognition of her labours m the Dunedin Hospital, and m the interests of nursing generally.

Miss Fraser had been a most devoted and loyal matron. She had practically organised the whole system of nursing, without having m the first place anything to guide her ; and that her success was great was evident from the fact that nurses trained m the Dunedin Hospital held a high place anywhere m the Dominion. It was only right that after Miss Fraser J s 19i years' service that something should be done to give her name a lasting place m connection with the hospital.