New-York tribune., 1875-01-14
FORK FOR THE NEW YE3R

We published on Friday last letter refer
ring to the Training School for Nurses, an ad-
mirable charity from which Bellevue Hospital
has already derived marked and it is to be
hoped permanent advantage. Order, cleanli-
ness. and q system of nursing at once skill
full and humane, have replaced the confusion
and neglect that disgraced the wards two
years ago. 1t is not necessary, however, to
cite facts to prove that as long as there are
patients in hospitals or in their own homes to
be cured, skilled nurses are required as much
as skilled physicians and that to qualify
women for that mode of earning their own
living, ;and giving them that very essential part
of the worlds work is worthy charity. Our
correspondent states that the $4,000 furnished
to establish the School is nearly exhausted,
and that it asks more, which :" no doubt New
York is too big-hearted to refuse" Now it
is very certain that the charity will
be supported even in these hard times If
its work is good but how much bet
ter would be its work if it supported it
self, and if the nurses and patients were
only laid under obligation for the noble
motive which placed help in their way!
We would suggest, for the consideration of
sustained, the plan of an old and larger estab-
lishment of the same kind under Quaker
management in Philadelphia, which has been
in successful operation for some thirty years,
and which it was Mr.. Greeley's earnest wish
should be initiated in this city. The "Nurses'
"Uomen of the Friends receives women
of good moral character, sound health and a
suitable age, during the time required for in
structon at q cost rate of board. Their tut
ton-clnical lectures, &C., given by the best
physicans,-is gratuitOus Attached to the
Home is charity by which poor women, to
the number of one or two thousand per
annum, are supplied in childbirth with medl-
cal Attendance and nurses. la this way the
nurse is trained in practical work under the
eve of her previous instructor. After six
months of this practice she is given diploma,
and ia held qualified to accept situations at
current rates of salary. The majority of these
nurses continue to board in the Home
when ont of work, some of them having been
there since the institution was opened A
register Is kept of their names, engage
ments, &C., for the inspection of those
who may wish TO employ them. This
Home became self-suppOrtng shortly after
its establishment, as every well-rcgulated
charity should, if possible be made to do, in
order that the sympathy and means of the
public may be diverted into other channels.
The benefit derived from it is threefold.
Women are furnished a profession at the
nominal cost of board; the sick, hospitals,
&C., are provided with a certain means of
obtaining experienced nurses, skilled i'll the
treatment of all diseases; and the caro- of a
physician and nurse Is given to numberless
poor women in the time of their sOrest need.
The plan of this institution. like most
Quaker charities. is based on the principle that
the best help is to teach men how to help
themselves, and we heartily commend it to
the consideration Of the managers who are
now soliciting material aid for our Training
School for the incoming year.