From nurse education, clinical, or workforce issues through to healthy living, Nursing Review has it covered.

One of the proudest memories of West Coast nursing hero, the recently retired clinical nurse educator Chris Black, is helping to train patients to give their own IV antibiotics so they could return home to their often isolated communities.

NAME: Chris Black
DHB: West Coast
JOB: Clinical nurse educator (retired), orthopaedic ward, Grey Base Hospital

When Chris Black and her husband shifted to the Coast, it was just to be a couple of years, but this year she retired after nearly 30 years’ nursing at Grey Base Hospital.

Chris had trained as a theatre nurse but first got casual work on the wards until she was employed permanently on Barclay (surgical) ward in 1985, and moved back into theatre at the end of 1986. But after a couple of years, she says, she was missing the patient interaction so moved back to work in Barclay and Couston (orthopaedic) wards.

Chris took a year’s maternity leave when her daughter was born in 1990 and then worked casually to ‘keep her hand in’ before resuming her full-time nursing career in 1994 when her husband Murray became redundant and stepped into the role of house husband.

During the 1990s, Chris and 12 others on Barclay ward started studying for the newly offered, long-distance Nelson Polytechnic bachelor of nursing degree for hospital-trained nurses. All the Barclay nurses graduated, along with 18 others from around the DHB.

In 2001 Chris was appointed associate clinical nurse leader of Barclay ward and since 2005 has been a clinical nurse educator. Chris says she has many fond memories and experiences. One initiative she has always been proud of was being involved with training patients to give their own IV antibiotics so that they could be discharged and take charge of their own lives in the community.

Karyn Bousfield, West Coast DHB’s director of nursing and midwifery, says during Chris’ career at the DHB she has been an inspiration to others. “Chris has long championed ongoing education, best practice and placing the patient at the centre of care. Her level of skill and knowledge is renowned and the nursing teams will miss her reassuring presence about the place; she is one of our heroes”

Chris (61) chose to retire a little earlier due to her husband’s health. Murray has cancer, and the two want time to spend doing things together.

Chris says she will miss the camaraderie of the working environment. “It’s the first hospital I’ve ever worked in where everybody is on first-name terms. In small hospitals you mean something to people – I’ve really noticed the amazing love and care since Murray has been sick.”

She says what makes a great nurse is their attention to detail, to the small things.

“I’ve really noticed while Murray has been a patient that there are some nurses who will check if he has a drink, will always wash their hands.”

And things have moved a long way from the first training Chris received, where you had to do what you were told. Now it is very much the nurse’s role to question, and to take responsibility when they make mistakes. 
“You want to be able to use that so everyone else can learn. If people are being put at risk by someone else’s practice, then you can’t stand back and ignore it.”