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Life as an NHS nurse in the 1950s: ‘Patients never had to wait on trolleys’

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Laurel Robertson, 89, was born in St Lucia. Part of the Windrush generation, she came to Britain in 1958 and joined the NHS, working in A&E at St James’s, Balham, and later in occupational health


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I started my training as a midwife in St Lucia. Then I saw an advertisement saying that they were desperate in London to have qualified persons to help out, so I came here in 1958, when I was 20, and trained for three years at Mount Vernon hospital in Northwood.

As a trainee in St Lucia, there were a lot of restrictions. You had to jump out the window to see your boyfriend, that sort of stuff. Things were strict over here, too: we weren’t allowed to go to parties, so we had to leave one window open and jump out. I have no idea what would have happened if we got caught – we were too well organised for that.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/2ts38uc

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