Happy 75th birthday NHS

Irrepressible Derry woman, Ursula Clifford, best known for her involvement in Feis Dhoire Cholmcille and the Colmcille Choir, has been immortalised in print.

Ursula, one of the first nurses in Altnagelvin, itself the first National Health Service (NHS) hospital built after WWII, has contributed to a book marking the iconic organisation’s 75th birthday.

Chatting to Derry Now, Ursula said she was delighted to have been asked to contribute to ‘Our Stories: 75 years of the NHS from the People Who Built It, Lived It and Love It’.

Edited by Stephanie Snow, with a foreword by Adam Kay, ‘Our Stories’ is described as “A beautiful and heart-warming collection of stories telling, for the first time ever, the rich history of the NHS through the ordinary people who have experienced it”.

‘Our Stories’ is divided into decades and Ursula is included in the 1970s, even though she started nursing in September 1959, at the age of 18, “straight from Thornhill”.

Ursula vividly recalled starting her nursing training in the old City and County Hospital.

“But we never worked in it,” she said, “because the initial training school was already over on the Altnagelvin Site, in Agnes Jones House, the big house in the grounds.

“That is where we were until Altnagelvin opened on February 1, 1960. We were in for a couple of weeks making up the beds and getting different rooms ready. We were there for the first patients.

“At that stage, we were the most junior nurses in the hospital. We were the first intake in the new hospital. Most of us were 18, now most of us are over 80.

“I think they thought we knew more than we did because they transferred the Waterside Hospital, which was part maternity and part surgical, first. They didn’t move geriatrics that remained in the Waterside for a long time. The Ear, Nose and Throat Hospital and the City and County Infirmary moved next.

“I remember us being put in charge of wards at night, although we did have Night Sisters, but at that stage there were only a few patients.

Ursula with her granddaughter Eirinn who graduated recently.

“I have to say, we were very proficient nurses by the time we had finished our three years training.

“It’s all changed now but, back then, we were making our own decisions and looking after the patients. It made us more able to identify diseases,” said Ursula, “and this was all before computers, so everything had to be written down.”

Ursula has organised a few class reunions. She recalled and spoke very warmly of her nursing colleagues.

“There was my friend, Margaret Curley, and there were three who emigrated to Canada after they graduated: Bridie McCann, a sister of Eamonn’s; Frances Barr, from the Top of the Hill; and a girl from Castlederg called Louis Kelly.

“There is a girl in Cardiff called Anne Gamble and another girl from Maghera called Maureen Lagan, and Olive Long from Raphoe, who was a district nurse in Derry for many years.

“Whenever Altnagelvin was 50 years old, Aisling [Ursula’s daughter] organised a reunion for everybody who was there when the hospital opened. 10 of my class came and I organised a trip to Rome for us for five days and I got them an audience with the Irish Ambassador. We keep in touch all the time,” said Ursula.

One of the most harrowing experiences of Ursula’s nursing career was Bloody Sunday, January 30, 1972, in Derry.

She said: “I was there for Bloody Sunday. I was on the parade and then I treated dying and dead and then I went in in an ambulance and worked all night.

“At that time I was working in the operating theatres. That day of Bloody Sunday was the first major disaster out of the whole Troubles.

“People were running around worried out of their minds. When I got out of that ambulance, which was packed with patients, I went through the old casualty and it was a nightmare. 

“It was packed with people looking for their relatives, crying. There were no seats left. People were propped up against pillars. It was total mayhem.

“When I got up to the operating theatres, we didn’t know which patient we were getting next. One of the surgeons was running around with a clipboard with names of the patients and their injuries on it, shouting, ‘What are you doing?’ and ‘You’ll be getting this and you’ll be getting that,” said Ursula grimly.

Etched on Ursula’s memory was assisting an orthopaedic surgeon with soft tissue injuries.

“We were in theatre and the fella with the clipboard was saying, ‘Leave it [the wound] open, leave it open’. What he meant was you don’t sew up a through and through wound. You are better to put in a drainage system, so if there is pus, it comes out.

“Nowadays, they have antibiotic pearls and beads they can put in. The surgeon said to me, that’s what they did in the Spanish Civil War, they left soft tissue wounds open.

“Thankfully we have progressed to nuts and bolts and bars now and saved people from having amputations, which, back in the day, was the only way it could have gone. Legs and other limbs have been saved,” said Ursula.

Ursula was full of admiration for the maxillofacial specialists.

She said: “When it came to the bombs, the facial maxillary people came into play.

“We had a fantastic surgeon and one of his patients who became quite  famous was a young fella in the Enniskillen bomb. Our surgeon made up a frame for his face because most of the bones in his face were broken. His face was restored.

“The maxillofacial people did great work to develop that skill and, in the end, I maintain we taught the world. 

“We went through all that trauma and we were able to cope. If I could make one change today regarding the NHS, regardless of protected meal times, I would invite a relative of a patient to come in and help them to eat, if they aren’t able to feed themselves.

“I would do the same for patients going through cancer treatment, where their appetite has gone. Wouldn’t you be better with a relative in helping them to take in nourishment.

“All in all, I am extremely proud to have worked in the NHS. I never regretted it. We were in the forefront of keyhole surgery with the late Mr Paul Bateson. It was a very exciting time.”

Our Stories: 75 years of the NHS from the People Who Built It, Lived It and Love It’ can be purchased here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/ Our-Stories-Years-People- Built/dp/1802793461. A portion of all proceeds goes to NHS Charities Together.