40. Bless you my child

Key words/phrases: St Bueno, Wales, advent of secular medicine, Florence Nightingale, Hospital for Sick Children Great Ormond Street, London, Children’s Ward and Sister Shaw at Joyce Green

No. 40

Today (21 April) is apparently the Feast Day of St Bueno, the Welsh saint and patron saint of animals and sick children.

St Bono (to use the latinised version of his name) was born in Powys in Wales. He was the son of a Welsh Princess but later on, after being educated in Caerwent, he took holy orders and became a priest.

History has it that whilst living in Holywell, Flintshire he offered to instruct his brother’s daughter Gwenfrewy (Winifred in English) in the ways of the Christian faith although unfortunately while the rest of her family was in church one day - so the story goes - his niece was troubled by the unwelcome attentions of a randy huntsman.

When Winifred rejected this outdoor type he chased her to the church steps and chopped off her head ! Her uncle the priest rushed out, cursed the hunter and then picking up his niece's head he replaced it on her shoulders - whereupon she was miraculously restored to life.

When he died in AD 640 St. Beuno was buried in a chapel near to his holy well. In bygone days people who were unwell we are told - but children in particular - were dipped in this well and then carried to the chapel where they were left to sleep overnight on the his tombstone. If they managed to sleep on it they were often found to have been cured the following morning, thus St Bono became associated with the healing of sick children.

Most people appreciate that between A.D. 500 - 1500 religion and health care were inextricably linked because of the absence of any scientific understanding of illness. However later on, because of the drastic decline in religious influence on a good most aspects of everyday life but also because of the ineffectiveness of folk medicine, scientific methods and approaches to managing illness began to blossom. The period 1500-1800 saw the advent of secular Medicine and very soon after this the first journal articles and books devoted to rational approaches to the care, including the care of sick children began to appear.

Florence Nightingale even emphasized children's nursing needs in her 1859 book “Notes on Nursing” saying : “It is the real test of a nurse whether she can nurse a sick infant.”

During the first half of the 19th Century doctors resisted getting involved with sick children in their new enlightened hospitals and practices however the situation changed in 1851 with the founding of the Hospital for Sick Children.

Dr Charles West and some colleagues rented a house in Great Ormond Street, London and established a ward with 10 beds for children between the ages 2-12 years who needed of hospital care … and the rest, as they say: “is history”. Well not quite ! Because of course paediatrics didn’t evolve as a specialist discipline without a struggle.

In the early 1900s children were cared for by physicians who normally cared for adults, children being seen as less important. These doctors-in-adult-medicine would often arrange to do their rounds to see these sick childen in between other more prestigious duties. In addition general physicians and obstetricians initially refused to accept the need for a separate specialty, implying that they were perfectly capable of dealing with what were, after all, only miniature adults.

During my 10-12 week clinical placement as a student on the Children’s Ward at Joyce Green I quickly learnt that babies, toddlers and youngsters live in very different worlds to our adult ones and that they had a very wide range of very special needs.

Even to this day I remain very grateful to Sister Shaw and her staff for all that they did in introducing me, and so many of my peers too, to the world of sick children’s care.

I have particularly vivid memories of working on night duty on the JGH kid’s ward with an exceptionally gifted Australian R.S.C.N and one nursing auxiliary and the three of us sitting bottle feeding umpteen babies on umpteen occasions - in between doing everything else that needed to be done. Talk about finishing painting the Forth Bridge and then having to restart the same task again almost immediately !

But I also remember being involved in the day-duty care of a very hyperactive little girl of 8 or 9yrs old who was being investigated for hyperthyroidism and oh boy - did she keep us busy. She never stopped rushing around the ward from morning to night !

What about this little gem to close with ?

School nurse to an 11yr old: “Have you ever been in hospital ?” Child: “Yes, once I had a fraction in my neck and had to stay in hospital for a long time.”