The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-09-12
AMATEUR NURSING.
Little Arts the Careful Housewife Should
Master.


The service of a professional nurse
are very highly valued in cases of seri-
Gus illness, or when there is the pres
encein family of the acute or perplex-
ing malady which taxes the strength
and skill of the care-takers as well as
the learning of the physician. In hos
pitfalls and asylums the presence of the
trained nurse, with her deft hand,
practieed eye, GOODNESS of nerve, and
restraint of emotion, has in these last
years brought change for the better
"a change that was greatly needed.
Readers of Dickens remember Sairy
Camp, and people who in other days
visited charity hospitals recall blear-
eyed and red-faced danes, of whom
Mrs. Camp was hardly carica ture.
All this is now out of date. The pro
fessional nurse is young, strong, self
assured, self-respecting. She knows
how to obey a doctors order, how to
put on bandage, to give medicine, to
make bed, to care for patient in the
best way. If she have a danger, it is
that her very facility may become me-
bilities may be blunted; that she may
grow Gallons and indifferent in the
stoicism which is at times her shield
against an excessive and enfee bling
sympathy. Taking them by and large,
however, nurses are womanly beings,
who come to our homes in our hours of
darkness like angels of comfort, whose
q r-ur lyr he TO- ierl,-
ly paid, and who deserve the recogni-
ton they usually receive.
Aside from the professional nurse,
the amateur nurse may be esteemed in
her hour of opportunity. In every
family, or at least in every group of
kinsfolk, there are one or two women
who have natural faculty for sooth-
ing and alternating pain. They know
how to shake pillow. how to lift and
change the posture of sufferer, how
to adjust the blinds and curtains, how
to walk across a room without up
setting things, how to give remedies
precisely as the physician says they
must be given. If the amateur nurse
of this order be one of large family
connection, and a spinster. she is al
ways in demand. Amy's children come
down with the measles, or Ruth's brood
have scarlet fever. Ruth and AMY
send at once for Aunt Esther, and her
entrance within their doors is a signal
for rejoicing. She does not lose her
head when somebody faints. or turn
pale herself at the sight of blood: and
if there be a boy in the house. with a
boys usual tendency to accidents and
this uncataIogued Sister
of Mercy knows exactly what TO do
for him, let the emergency be what it
may.
There are certain elementary things
which woman ought to master If she
can, so that she may take upon her
self the role of amateur nurse upon
occasion.
First, woman needs no professional
training to teach her the value OF ac-
curacy, as opposed to inconsequence
and haphazarGness, II the sick-roonn
Years ago a woman died-a woman in
a New England town-whose life was
a benediction TO whole community
The nurse made a mistake in the order
Of two medicines, and calmly admins :
tered teaspOenful where she should 4
have given a few drops Her blunder 1
was fatal Amateur or professional. /
nobody Is 1T 10 be trusted with so deli /
cate and so responsible duty as that 4
Of nursing who Is capable of making /
this sort Of mistake
The amateur nurse should be able 20 4
spread Z pouItice, FL hot-water bot I
tie. fan Z heated patient. change the I
and sheets o. a sick person I,
without subjecting the person 20 chill /
and cold: she should have anna bility. I
"a pabiIity and common-sense. Indeed. /
he last quality takes precedence Of 1
almost every other. There are few st
nations in life where It j. not exceed
ngiy valuable, and almost inaispe1sa-
pie
Not long ago. in a paper widely read.
there appeared this advertisement. a
nurse desire . position as
-are-talser u AZ invalid or elderly lady
,he WA relieve her patient u al 20
lcituGe I could not but hop- that
.yo persons were made happy by the
con junction-the self-tzaQht I
y amateur nurse and the one whom (
ne sought to take beneath Ger wing