What Is Lucy Osburn's Role In Nursing

845 Words2 Pages

Lucy Osburn was an English nurse born at Leeds. She had been trained at The School of Nursing – founded by Florence Nightingale – that had been attached St Thomas’ Hospital and Kaiserwerth Hospital in Dusseldorf, Germany, a hospital that had greatly impacted Florence Nightingale’s ideology as a young nurse. After Henry Parkes, the Premier of New South Wales at that time, requested Florence Nightingale for trained nurses in order to reform nursing in New South Wales and introduce Florence Nightingale’s style of nursing to Australia and train nurses for hospitals around the country, Lucy was appointed as the lady superintendent with a salary of £150, and together with 5 other trained nurses set sail for Australia and arrived in Sydney on the 5th March 1868. …show more content…

She maintained a hierarchical system in which she was in charge of the nurses and the nursing instead of the medical staff being in charge of the nurses. Lucy also established a nursing register including the details of the nursing students were noted and she demanded good living conditions for the nurses. As she continued her work, she faced many hurdles, including copping the blame for multiple public riots over issues that she did not have control over, such as maintaining clean and hygienic wards and rebuilding dilapidated buildings, Florence Nightingale distancing herself from Lucy, and even getting betrayed by the 5 nurses she came to Australia with. Nonetheless, with the strong support of Henry Parkes and a few other high-ranking associates, she endured multiple public encounters. One of her most unforgettable incidents was when Prince Alfred – Queen Victoria’s second eldest son – was shot in the back in an attempt of assassination. Luckily, the attempt was unsuccessful, as the bullet bounced off his rib cage and did not fatally wound

Open Document