The history of nursing in the British Empire / by Sarah A. Tooley.

  • Sarah Anne Tooley
Date:
1906
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The history of nursing in the British Empire / by Sarah A. Tooley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    carried by the British Medical Association meeting at Oxford. A bill in favour of registration was introduced into the House of Commons by Mr. Munro Ferguson, February 23, 1905. The Select Committee was re- appointed, March 30, to consider the expediency of providing for the registration of nurses. It issued its Report, July 25, 1905. Thirty-four experts, comprising distinguished men and women in the medical and nursing world, were examined before the Select Committee, and the evidence was conflicting. The Apvocares for State registration contended that it was desirable to establish a minimum standard of efficiency, determined by a Central Nursing Board, which would test whether the training received came up to modern requirements. At present each hospital and training institution has its own standard. Some are excellent, others deficient. The aim of regis- tration was to bring all into line and make a one efficient portal entrance into the nursing profession. It was also believed that registration would raise the tone of nursing throughout the country, and serve as a test for training schools as well as for nurses, and would stimulate the appointment of matrons competent to educate their pro- bationers up to the point required by the Central Board. The latter should appoint experts—doctors and nurses— to be its examiners. A public register should be kept of nurses who had passed the examination, and the efficiency and moral standing of the nurses would be kept up by their being required to report themselves at intervals to the Central Board. By such means it was hoped to do away with the untrained, semi-trained, and bogus nurses, and to protect the public from imposture, and also to place nursing on such a high basis that educated women would regard it as a desirable and honourable profession. Evidence was further adduced to show that State regis- tration was working well in New Zealand, Cape Colony, and Natal; that the feeling in favour of it is strong in Australia; and that in America eight States had passed
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