THE NURSING PROFESSION
one hundred and fifty years ago, nurses were unpaid, untrained, and unpopular, but then Florence Nightingale made nursing into a profession. The methods she introduced in the 1850s were copied all over the world and now nursing is a career with a three-or four- year training qualifications, grades, and pensions In Britain, every nurse is on grade. The grade depends on and experience and skills,and each grade has different responsibilities and pay. On the bottom unqualified auxiliary nurse who do the routine work on hospital wards. On the top grades are nursing officers, who are usually administrators.
Auxiliary nurses are on the bottom grades, but student nurses get the lowest pay. However, students don't say at the bottom of the pay scale forever. When they qualify, they start working on a middle grade. As they get experience, they can get promotion and move up the ranks to become staff nurse, then sister (charge nurse.if a man), and perhaps eventually nursing officer
Many nurses work shifts, and often they work overtime to earn more money. After basic training, many nurses choose to do further study and become specialists. can specialize in many different fields: there are triage nurses working in Casualty, and psychiatric nurses who treat the mentally ill. There are health visitors who visit patients in their own homes, p nurses working in GPs' surgeries and midwives who deliver babies.
Many of them say they do not get enough pay and respect for the work they do. They say that the work is physically and mentally hard, that they work long hours and get very tired. But they also say that there are many great rewards which have nothing to do with money.