A FORMER Christchurch nurse has been sharing her memories of the NHS’s early years in the run-up to the institution’s 70th birthday.

For nearly 25 years Edith ‘Pip’ Holland, was a nurse at a variety of different hospitals all over the country, but worked mainly at Christchurch Hospital and others in the Bournemouth area.

Although she retired from nursing almost 25 years ago to run a hotel business with her husband, Stan, Pip, now 86, has fond memories of the early days of the health service.

At the most basic level she believes that being an NHS nurse helped her make her way in life. “I didn’t always have a happy childhood,” she said, explaining how she was born in London, brought up by her grandmother and ran away from home at least twice.

Pip started her training at Grantham Hospital in Lincolnshire. “I thought how lucky the nurses were to be at the hospital,” she said.

Her day was split into training and lessons in the mornings, followed by the practical side on the wards in the afternoons. “There was a large skeleton in the corner of the classroom,” she remembered.

Her first introduction to Bournemouth was when she came for a short break during her student days with a friend. “It was my first glimpse of the sea and I fell in love with the place,” she said.

After seeing an advert in the Nursing Mirror for SENs (State Enrolled Nurses) at what is now Christchurch Hospital, she applied, was accepted, and moved south.

However, despite her praise for the NHS she described the hospital as being ‘like a workhouse’ when she first started nursing there.

“To be quite honest it was an awful place,” she said. “I did the night duty – 12 hour shifts - from 8pm to 8am and always looked forward to hearing the dawn chorus from the hospital’s courtyard.”

At the time visitors needed the consent of the governor to visit any of the 50 patients and it was rare for friends and families to see them. Pip felt, however, that Christchurch began to lose its workhouse feel to become more of a general hospital while she worked there.

She went on to work at the Royal National Hospital and Chest Clinic which was based in St Stephen’s Road in Bournemouth, caring mainly for asthmatic patients and those suffering other chest diseases.

Despite the arduous hours she decided to continue with night shifts which fitted in with her family life and bringing up her four children.

Pip now goes back to Christchurch Hospital where she receives treatment for arthritis, while nursing still continues in the family with her daughter working as a theatre practitioner at the Queen Alexandra Hospital in Portsmouth.

Looking back over her nursing career, Pip feels the NHS has made leaps and bounds in the care and treatment it now offers.

“I was happy with what I was doing and am glad that I chose nursing, not only just as a job but for all the people and friends I made,” she said.

*Thanks to Stephen Feldman for his help with this article.