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The ward manager: 'You don’t go into nursing for the money' The ward manager: 'You don’t go into nursing for the money'
(6 months later)
Natalie Shillito always wanted to be a nurse – driven by the desire to care. 29 years on that hasn’t changed, but the profession has been transformed since she started out as a £3,000-a-year student nurse in a London teaching hospital.Natalie Shillito always wanted to be a nurse – driven by the desire to care. 29 years on that hasn’t changed, but the profession has been transformed since she started out as a £3,000-a-year student nurse in a London teaching hospital.
Shillito says: “I wanted to make people better and I think nursing back in the 80s was also quite glamorous – there was the series on TV about student nurses called Angels, Casualty had just started and there was ER. It was a respected profession. It’s changed a lot since then. There used to be limits on what we could do – we couldn’t, for example, give the first doses of intravenous antibiotics, but now there are nurse prescribers.”Shillito says: “I wanted to make people better and I think nursing back in the 80s was also quite glamorous – there was the series on TV about student nurses called Angels, Casualty had just started and there was ER. It was a respected profession. It’s changed a lot since then. There used to be limits on what we could do – we couldn’t, for example, give the first doses of intravenous antibiotics, but now there are nurse prescribers.”
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Today, Shillito, 46, is ward manager of a trauma and orthopaedic ward at the Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath, West Sussex. Earning £35,000, she has responsibility for a total of 68 healthcare assistants and nurses and works a 37.5-hour week. “You don’t go into nursing for the money,” she quips.Today, Shillito, 46, is ward manager of a trauma and orthopaedic ward at the Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath, West Sussex. Earning £35,000, she has responsibility for a total of 68 healthcare assistants and nurses and works a 37.5-hour week. “You don’t go into nursing for the money,” she quips.
She is the “middle man” between the ward nurses and senior managers, but still insists on taking time away from her desk to care for patients. “I still want to be involved in clinical practice. I think it’s vital that I work alongside our workforce to support them and also show them that I have expectations and I expect them to follow my example.”She is the “middle man” between the ward nurses and senior managers, but still insists on taking time away from her desk to care for patients. “I still want to be involved in clinical practice. I think it’s vital that I work alongside our workforce to support them and also show them that I have expectations and I expect them to follow my example.”
Staff shortages, financial pressures and the physical and emotional demands of managing a ward of 43 very sick people can be challenging: “We are only human.” But she feels her place on the ward is as important as a doctor’s. “Nurses and doctors provide 24-hour care but nurses and healthcare assistants look at it more holistically – it’s not just about what the charts say. It used to be when a doctor said ‘jump’ a nurse would reply ‘how high?’ That wouldn’t happen today.”Staff shortages, financial pressures and the physical and emotional demands of managing a ward of 43 very sick people can be challenging: “We are only human.” But she feels her place on the ward is as important as a doctor’s. “Nurses and doctors provide 24-hour care but nurses and healthcare assistants look at it more holistically – it’s not just about what the charts say. It used to be when a doctor said ‘jump’ a nurse would reply ‘how high?’ That wouldn’t happen today.”
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