THE TRAINED NURSE. 
HER WORK AND OPPORTUNITIES. 
What special qualities are called for in a can¬ 
didate for a nurses’training school’ IIow long 
is the course of training? Is any salary paid 
during the period of tuition ? Do the smaller 
hospitals, outside of the large cities, receive 
pupils ? What is the usual salary paid to a com¬ 
petent nurse? Do you regard the profession as 
over-crowded, or do you look upon it as an excel¬ 
lent opportunity for an energetic woman ? What 
preliminary education do you regard as neces¬ 
sary ? 
The N. Y. Training School for Nurses. 
One of the oldest and bestknown train¬ 
ing schools for nurses in this country is 
that attached to Bellevue Hospital, New 
York City, which is nowin the 24th year 
of its existence. The course of instruc¬ 
tion covers a period of two years ; the 
preferable age for candidates is from 25 
to 32 years. The applicant must send 
answers to the questions in a printed 
form with which she will be supplied, 
and also a letter from a clergyman testi¬ 
fying to her good moral character, and 
one from a physician stating that she 
is in sound health. Applicants are re¬ 
ceived at any time of the year when 
there is a vacancy. A good education 
is indispensable. After receiving the 
approval of the superintendent,the appli¬ 
cant is taken in upon probation for two 
months. During this period, the pupils 
are boarded and lodged at the expense 
of the school, but receive no other com¬ 
pensation. After the trial months, those 
who prove satisfactory are accepted as 
pupil nurses, after signing an agreement 
to remain two years in the training 
school. If a nurse, for reasons of her 
own, leaves the school before the two 
years have expired, she is expected to 
refund to the school the money she has 
cost it. The pupils reside in the Nurses’ 
Home, and serve for the first year as 
assistants in Bellevue ; the second year 
they are expected to perform any duty 
assigned to them by the superintendent, 
either to act as nurses in the hospital, 
or to be sent to private cases among the 
rich or poor. 
The pay for the first year is $7 a month ; 
for the second year $12 a month. This 
sum is allowed for the dress, text-books, 
and other expenses of the nurse, in con¬ 
nection with her work, and is in no wise 
intended as wages, it being considered 
that the education given is a full equiva¬ 
lent for services. After the months of 
probation, the nurses are expected to 
wear when on duty, the dress prescribed 
by the institution, which is of blue and 
white seersucker, white apron and cap, 
linen collar and cuffs. The day nurses 
are on duty from 8 am. to 8 p. m., with 
an hour for dinner. They are also often 
given an afternoon during the week, and 
a half-day on Sunday. 
When the full term of two years is 
ended, the nurses thus trained can choose 
their own field of labor. The Training 
School has a registry of graduates, and 
competent nurses may be obtained 
through this. The terms are from $3 to 
$5 a day, according to the nature of the 
case. 
Most of the local hospitals in smaller 
cities have now established nurses’ train¬ 
ing schools, some of them of very high 
standing. The wisest plan for any one 
desirous of taking up this work is first 
to consult the family physician ; he can 
judge of the applicant’s eligibility, and 
also advise her of any nearby school. 
Nursing is a fine profession, but a very 
exacting one, and only women thor¬ 
oughly sound in body and mind should 
attempt it. 
though less in size than the great city 
hospitals, are quite as desirable in their 
educational facilities. The trimly-clad 
nurse in our illustration, Fig. 135, is one 
of the students in the Hackensack Hos¬ 
pital, Hackensack, N. J. This is a com¬ 
paratively small hospital, but a very 
progressive one, and the instruction 
given is of a high class. 
The rules regarding applicants are 
similar to those quoted above. One 
wishing to obtain this course of instruc¬ 
tion must apply to the supervising 
nurse, upon whose approval she will be 
received into the hospital for one month 
on probation. The acceptable age for 
candidates is from 22 to 30 years. The 
applicant should send, with answers to 
the paper of questions, a letter from a 
clergyman testifying to her good moral 
character, also one from a physician 
stating that she is in sound health. 
Applicants are received at any time 
during the year when there is a vacancy. 
During the month of trial, and previous 
to obtaining a position in the hospital, 
the applicant must be prepared for an 
examination in reading, penmanship and 
simple arithmetic. The examination is 
to test the applicant’s ability to read 
well aloud, to write legibly and accu¬ 
rately and to keep simple accounts. This 
amount of education is indispensable for 
women desiriEg hospital training, but 
applicants are reminded that women of 
superior education and cultivation, when 
equally qualified for nurses, will be pre¬ 
ferred to those who do not possess these 
advantages. 
During the month of probation, the 
applicant is boarded and lodged at the 
expense of the hospital, but receives no 
other compensation. It is not necessary 
that she should wear the uniform of the 
hospital, but she must come provided 
with dresses of washing material. Those 
who prove satisfactory will be accepted, 
after signing an agreement to remain 
two years in this hospital as nurse, and 
them by the supervising nurse, either to 
act as nurse in the hospital, or to be 
sent to private cases among the rich and 
poor. The applicant gets her board, 
room and laundering, and also $5 per 
month for the first year and $10 per 
month for the second year. This sum is 
allowed for the dress, text-books, and 
other personal expenses of the nurse, 
and is in nowise intended as wages, it 
being considered that the training given 
is a full equivalent for their services. 
They are required, after the month of 
probation, when on duty, to wear the 
dress prescribed by the institution. 
The course of training includes, among 
other instructions, the dressing of blis¬ 
ters, burns, sores and wounds ; the 
application of fomentations, poultices, 
cups and leeches; the management of 
helpless patients ; making beds; mov¬ 
ing, changing, giving bath in bed, and 
preventing and dressing bed-sores. 
Bandaging, making bandages and roll¬ 
ers, and lining of splints, and the pre¬ 
paring, cooking and serving of delicacies 
for the sick, are also taught. Nurses 
are trained to take care of rooms and 
wards ; to keep all utensils perfectly 
clean and disinfected ; to make accurate 
observations and reports to the physician 
of the state of the secretions, expectora¬ 
tion, pulse, skin, appetite, temperature 
of the. body, intelligence—as delirium 
or stupor—breathing, sleep, condition 
of wounds, eruptions, formation of mat¬ 
ter, effect of diet, or of stimulants, or of 
medicines; and to learn the manage¬ 
ment of convalescents. 
As to the possibilities of the profes¬ 
sion, “there’s always room at the top,” 
say the authorities at Hackensack Hos¬ 
pital. Capable, clear-headed women, 
who understand and enjoy their work, 
will make a success of nursing, as of 
everything else. These lesser hospitals 
in small towns offer a desirable field of 
instruction for women in the country 
districts, and, we would suggest to such 
aspirants that they seek these institu¬ 
tions. The visiting physicians include 
famous specialists, who lecture before 
the nurses, in addition to the regular 
course of instructions given by the 
house physicians. The clinical instruc¬ 
tion is likely to be quite as varied as in 
a city hospital, for there is usually a 
large number of surgical cases, as well 
as ordinary illness. 
For a country girl who wishes to fit 
herself for this work, the first requisite 
is sound health. No woman with defec¬ 
tive sight or hearing, with a weak back 
or delicate chest, should ever think of 
the nurse's profession. She should, at 
least, have a good common school educa¬ 
tion, and should be ready to study, with 
close attention, any subjects bearing on 
her specialty. She may be fitting her¬ 
self for her chosen profession during 
several years before her hospital train¬ 
ing begins. As a rule, a girl is most 
anxious to begin a course of hospital 
training immediately after leaving 
school, but the hospital will not take 
her at that age, and rightly, too. A 
woman of 25, who wishes to adopt this 
profession, has everything in her favor, 
since at that age both mental and bodily 
constitution should be settled. It is not 
an easy life ; far from it, but it gives an 
interesting and honorable life-work, in 
which ability is freely recognized and 
repaid. 
Sanitarium Nursing. 
Perhaps the one quality most called 
for in a mere candidate, is capacity for 
obedience. Ability for thorough study 
is also a requisite, since there is always 
work to the limit of the nurse’s strength, 
while lectures, examinations, etc., are a 
constant part of the weekly routine. 
A good memory is a sustaining help 
throughout, both in the study and in the 
applied training. Many of the qualities 
for which we look in a nurse, may be 
merely dormant in the candidate. The 
training is largely for the purpose of de¬ 
veloping many of the necessary quali¬ 
ties, as well as qualifications. Cheerful¬ 
ness, courage, firmness, patience and, 
above all, self-control, may be developed 
in great degree. No work offers a bet¬ 
ter field for ability, r 
The most usual period of training is, 
probably, two years. Some of the better 
schools are now requiring three years. 
The salary paid a graduate varies ; 
not so much, perhaps, as yet, with ca¬ 
pacity as with location. About $10, I 
think, is the minimum per week, $15 to 
$20 is nearer the recognized fair com¬ 
petence, while more is paid in special 
cases, as in contagious diseases. The 
profession is far from being overcrowded, 
except, possibly, in a few of the large 
cities. The call for trained service is 
increasing very rapidly. At present, 
the greatest obstacle in the way of the 
trained worker is the lack of means 
which compels hundreds to pay $6 per 
week to the untrained, “old-fashioned ” 
nurse (who has had some experience, yet 
may have nothing else to recommend 
her), when they really want the trained 
nurse, but cannot pay the price her 
training is worth. Naturally all reading 
and study previously done in medical 
and hygienic lines is of inestimable 
value in rendering both the work and 
the study of the regular course more 
easy to grasp ; while, as in other lines, 
the more of general knowledge one has, 
the better panoplied is she for the field 
of battle. Music, languages and a knowl¬ 
edge of simple games, all of which might 
seem to be foreign to nursing, are of 
inestimable value to both nurse and 
patient, as they help wonderfully 
through the tedious periods of convales¬ 
cence. In fact, whatever can make the 
worker more intellectual, more enter¬ 
taining, in brief, more agreeable, is of 
the utmost value, especially in private 
nursing. myra y. norys. 
A Country Hospital. 
But it is not in the great cities alone 
that a woman may study the nurse’s to obey the rules of the institution, 
profession. There are many institutions They will reside in the hospital and be 
in the smaller country towns, which, expected to perform any duty assigned 
THE TRAINED NURSE—THE DOCTOR’S RIGHT HAND. Fig. 135. 
