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NURSING SERVICES
Public health nursing has none of the drama of modern hospital procedures, but the work of the
community nursing services is one of the foundations of the health of the country, for as has been said,
"the health of the people lies in their homes."
The nursing staff of the borough have had a busy and active year, during which all the usual fields of
work continued, health visiting, school nursing, home nursing, midwifery, visiting tuberculous patients and
day nursery work. There was particular involvement with those members of the public, who are especially
vulnerable, the aged, the chronic sick, expectant and nursing mothers and children of all ages, extra
attention being paid to those in danger of neglect or "battering" and the handicapped. The aim of the daily
work was, as always, to nurse, to help, to advise and to educate, in the child health centres, in the homes of
the people, in schools, colleges, clubs and in hospitals.
Interest in community nursing has increased greatly, particularly since the General Nursing Council's new
syllabus of 1969, which made public health nursing one of the choices open to student nurses during their
training. With this in mind, the nursing section held a symposium on community nursing at the Whittington
Hospital, in the course of which four members of staff spoke to 90 departmental and ward sisters about
their work. Following this, arrangements were made for ward sisters to spend time in the community, a
health visitor started attending a paediatric ward round and a geriatric visitor geriatric ward rounds. A
further step in the field of closer linkage between hospital and community nursing was taken when the
General Nursing Council approved a 12 weeks' training period for student nurses from the Royal Northern
Hospital to be spent with nurses of the borough. Home nurses now attend sessions with the physiotherapist
at the hospital, so that they can rehabilitate patients in their own homes more effectively, particularly in
disabling diseases such as strokes. Stroke rehabilitation was the subject when the B.B.C. television unit
filmed the Islington home nurses at work toward the end of the year. This film was one in a series of
teaching films for student nurses in hospital.
We continued — though slowly — with attachments and liaison of health visitors and home nurses to
general practitioners, and altogether 22 general practitioners were involved with such schemes. A second
health visitor started work with a special mothers' group at the National Children's Home.
Lough Road Day Nursery was opened in April and in spite of national shortage we were able to find the
necessary staff for the new nursery. The Department of Health and Social Security approved the nursery as
a training nursery for nursery students as from September, 1970.
A great number of students were received during the year, including a party of 15 Dutch post-graduate
public health students, whom the Royal College of Nursing had asked us to give an insight into British
public health nursing. The Department of Health and Social Security arranged for a three-day visit by the
head of the West Berlin Child Day Care Section to see what the borough provided in that field.
With the ever changing pattern of medical, paediatric, geriatric and social knowledge it is essential that
nursing staff keep abreast of new developments in these various fields. A number of staff attended courses
during the year, either in-service courses or those run by other agencies. With the publication of the Report
of the Working Party on Management Structure in the Local Authority Nursing Services plans were made
for senior nursing staff to attend courses in management.
The year brought an expansion of the family planning services provided by the borough and several
members of staff were trained in family planning to enable them to play an active part in this service. A
number of midwives and health visitors took part in a survey carried out by the Institute for Social Studies
in Medical Care on Birth Control Services.
During 1970 Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, said: "The trouble with prevention is that it has none
of the glamour of achievement. Achievement is measurable, something was wrong, I have put it right! If
you have prevented something happening, there is nothing to say, that it would have happened." This truly
applies to the work of the nursing section and we can only hope that by our daily work, our teaching and
learning we may have contributed to the health and happiness of the people of Islington.
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