Selwyn Burton from Villa Road is sharing newspaper article about psychiatric nurse recruitment at St Edwards Hospital. His dad, Stan, and 2 Uncles all worked there. This article is from 1968.

“Nursing is a rewarding career“

‘Better Selection of student nurses…’

Quite a lot of this page from 1968 is given to recruiting nurses to work in St. Edward’s Hospital. They acknowledge that there is a ‘better selection of student nurses than ever before’. To qualify you would have needed:

• 2 ‘O’ levels or 3 CSE grade 1 passes;
• or, success in the General Nursing council’s Educational Test.

Five ‘O’ levels and a ‘couple of A Levels’ will get you an’unlimited career in psychiatric nursing’! It is not all down to qualifications you have to have a good personality too.

…it is important to have understanding, emotional stability, moral integrity and a general desire to contribute to the well-being of the patient.

Mr JJ Leonard, principle tutor at St Edwards

“Female dominance at the top of the profession…has now vanished…”

“The top jobs are now open to both male and female. The female dominance at the top of the nursing hierarchy has now vanished and there is even more scope for the conscientious young man.” ” Psychiatric nursing has a great deal to offer to men in that they are guarantee, once fully trained, a secure job for life without the threat of unemployment or redundancy. Over 30,000 men are in professional nursing, most of them being in the psychiatric hospitals. “