To Break A Doctor's Heart. Sharon Kendrick

did like a bolt out of the blue, she wouldn’t have been standing here in her brand new uniform, but would probably have been yawning her way through yet another photo session.

      As she passed the Pharmacy, down the same wide corridor, she reflected on how much she had enjoyed the Introductory Block, and how she had taken to studying again like a duck to water.

      Contrary to what her mother had told her, she had positively thrived under all the new intellectual demands. The uninterested pale student of her schooldays, still reeling from her parents’ divorce, had blossomed into an eager consumer of all this new, scientific knowledge. She had found the anatomy and physiology fascinating—it was like the most marvellous detective story she had ever read, to discover how the human body worked. Mrs Haynes was an enthusiastic teacher, and covered some basic bio-chemistry and pathology in her lectures.

      ‘It isn’t strictly necessary for a nurse to know any of the chemical pathologies. But no knowledge is ever wasted, and the broader your education, then the better nurse you’ll be for it,’ she had told them.

      Claire walked briskly up the stairs to the first floor corridor, her new black shoes shining brightly. At the ward entrance she stood peering around, feeling for a moment very young and inexperienced, and then she spotted a sign saying ‘Sister’s Office’ and, clearing her throat nervously, she tapped softly on the door.

      A voice called out ‘Come in’ and she stepped inside.

      The Ward Sister, distinguishable by her dark navy dress and elaborately frilled cap, sat at her desk, a coffee cup in front of her and a set of notes by her hand. She looked to be in her late thirties, was very plump, and had the kindest face that Claire had ever seen.

      ‘Hello there,’ she said. ‘Nurse Scott, isn’t it?’

      Claire nodded. ‘Yes, Sister.’

      ‘Good! Nice and early, that’s what I like to see. Now, I’m just about to get the night report from Sister, so I’ll get Nurse Hunter to show you where to hang your cloak, and what’s where, and then you can all come in for report after you’ve given out the breakfasts. Nurse!’ she called in a loud voice from the door, and a nurse as tall as Claire appeared. She wore her thick black hair tied back in a bun and looked at Sister inquisitively.

      ‘Show Student Nurse Scott where to hang her cloak and around the ward, will you, Hunter?’

      ‘Yes, Sister. Follow me.’

      Claire trotted off obediently behind her. The blue belt she wore identified her as a third-year.

      ‘This,’ announced Nurse Hunter, ‘is Belton Ward.’

      It was an old-fashioned Nightingale ward in design, with rows of beds on either side of a central aisle. At the far end was the patients’ day-room and the four bathrooms. Sister’s office, the clinic-room, doctors’ office, kitchen and sluice were nearest the ward entrance.

      ‘You’ll soon get to know where everything is,’ the older nurse advised Claire. ‘Come on, we’d better get a move on.’

      Then began the busiest morning that Claire had ever known. She scarcely had time to draw breath as they tipped cornflakes into bowls, poured teas and dolloped spoonfuls of marmalade on to the sides of plates. And all the time Nurse Hunter kept up an astonishingly fluent commentary which had Claire’s mind in a spin, wondering if she would be able to remember any of it.

      ‘That’s the sluice over there, but you don’t keep going in and out of there at mealtimes, not unless you absolutely have to—or Sister’ll have your guts for garters. Morning, Mr Atkins! Pleased to be going home, are you? Mr Atkins has been with us nearly three months, haven’t you, Mr Atkins?’ she asked him cheerfully.

      ‘Yes, Nurse. Looked after me good and proper, you ’ave.’

      Nurse Hunter beamed and piled two heaped teaspoonfuls of sugar into his tea. ‘Always try and learn whether your patient has any special dietary needs,’ she confided. ‘I’ll never forget on my first ward when I asked a diabetic patient if he wanted sugar!’ She burst into laughter at the memory, the smile lighting up her rather sallow face.

      After they had finished serving out the breakfasts, she showed Claire where the clinic-room was. ‘That’s where we draw up injections and get out dressing trolleys ready,’ she explained. ‘And never take a dirty dressing trolley back in until you’ve cleaned it down properly, or Sister’ll be after you!’

      Sister sounded formidable, thought Claire, although Nurse Hunter seemed to speak of her quite affectionately.

      ‘Let’s just strip this bed before report,’ she stopped by a rumpled empty bed. ‘Mr Fellowes is always first into the bathroom. Then he goes down to the day-room for a smoke.’

      Claire looked surprised. ‘Are they allowed to smoke, then?’

      The other girl pulled a face. ‘Not really, but some of the old boys have smoked for so long that they just can’t give it up. Sister lets them have one or two if they’re desperate.’

      So the practice didn’t always follow the theory, thought Claire as she and Nurse Hunter rhythmically folded each sheet and blanket into three and then turned the bottom sheet over and straightened it. Mrs Haynes would be horrified to think that smoking was allowed!

      Sister Thompson appeared at the door of her office, beaming widely down the ward.

      ‘Morning, gentlemen,’ she cried.

      ‘Morning, Sister!’ they chorused back at her.

      ‘Right, girls. Into my office for report, please.’

      ‘What’s your first name?’ hissed Nurse Hunter as they trooped into Sister’s office behind two yellow-belted second-year nurses.

      ‘Claire. What’s yours?’

      ‘It’s Anna—but christian names aren’t allowed on the wards. Don’t forget!’

      Claire nodded and sat down next to Anna Hunter, her pen and notebook in her hand, thinking what an awful lot of rules there were to remember.

      Sister then began to run through a list of the patients, their age, diagnosis and treatment and whether there had been any change in their condition during the night.

      ‘You won’t understand much to begin with,’ she told Claire kindly. ‘But don’t worry—by the time you leave us, you’ll be telling me what to do!’

      She let out a great thundering guffaw at this remark and the other nurses, including Claire, laughed politely, though she could never imagine knowing a fraction of the conditions which had been mentioned already. Pleural effusion; diabetic keto-acidosis; congestive cardiac failure; unexplained splenomegaly and purpura—the list seemed endless, and she wasn’t even sure that she had spelt them properly!

      It was all very well learning the twelve cranial nerves in class by reciting a complicated rhyme:

      ‘On old Olympus’ towering tops

      A fierce and glowering vulture always hops.’

      But learning about real diseases was going to prove a lot more difficult.

      She realised that Sister was speaking to her.

      ‘I’d like you to do a blanket bath on a patient who was admitted during the night with acute bronchitis. He’s a bit washed out this morning, poor fellow.’ She smiled at Claire. ‘If you get stuck—just ask. Don’t be shy. Things are always a bit hectic here, especially first thing in the morning, and I have to get ready for Dr Stellingworth’s ward round. But later on I’ll show you round properly.

      ‘Right then, let me introduce you to your patient.’

      She walked swiftly to the second nearest bed to her office. A very thin, anxious-looking man, his face partially obscured by a green oxygen mask, lay gasping against a great heap of pillows.

      ‘Good morning, Mr Lucas,’ said Sister quietly,