Thornton View hospital

Thornton View hospital was an 82-bed geriatric hospital near Clayton, West Yorkshire, on the site of the North Bierley Union workhouse.^[1]

It was occupied by staff led by Alex Corina resisting closure from August 1983 until April 1985.^[2] I was the Male Unit Charge Nurse, paid as a Ward Charge Nurse at £625.00 per annum from July 1959 to December 1959, there were two excellent GP's from the Necropolis Road Surgery ( a name to conjure with) and two SEAN Nurses, I was the only SRN. I forget exactly how many patients we had, but we had a small annexe of about 10 beds plus two large wards, a long ward divided by the office and stairwell to the upstairs female wing, were Norman Pedder was the Charge Nurse. The Hospital was then an Approved SEAN training hospital and there was a very pleasant female Tutor who I rarely met, we had no pupils on the Male Wing. I have forgotten who was Matron and Assistant Matron, also forgotten who the Consultant was who I knew slightly from my days at St. Luke's were I trained 1949/52 I qualified at 21 in October 1952, Matron Copeland referenced me for the job, as I had ceased Nursing and gone to study with the intention of being a Doctor. The Male Unit was a very caring unit, our patients were very poorly but no further remedies were available to treat them, it was virtually a hospice then generally unknown. Part three accommodation was on the same site, and they would supply clothing, new suits, which would cheer up some of our patients who could sit in a chair by their bed. By today's standards this was a very modest enterprise, we worked a 48 hours week, my SEAN Staff Nurses were on £500.00 enhanced pay per annum, how much is that per hour, even taking inflation into account, it was a hard time in retrospect, but at the time that is how things were. I had been a Student District Nurse in Bradford after qualifying at St.luke's for six months on £325.00 I had District X and used bus tokens to travel about, I mention this because 4 years later when I was at Thornton View, one of the patients was then an in-patient, he had MS his gallant wife visited every day.

References