Apprentice in Black Stockings: An Australian Nursing Memoir by Norma Sim

Book Description

Secondhand. Good condition. Wear to book corners and edges. Right side corners of front cover reinforced with book tape. Some faint marks on foredges. Price on half-title page is now covered with blank ex libris bookplate sticker. Scratch on back cover is protected with book tape. Body text and binding are still very good.

This absorbing account takes the reader into the spotless hospital wards, strictly overseen by the ward sister; the operating theatres that are the masculine domain of the doctors; and the nurses' home where camaraderie builds among the young women.

The pleasures the nurses find on their days off and the exciting offerings of a large city, including romance, are set against the backdrop of post-war Australia.

Interspersed are flashbacks to Lucy Osburn and her five Florence Nightingale nurses who arrived in Sydney in 1868 to introduce the new revolutionary nursing practices of the day.

Norma Sim graduated from Sydney Hospital Nursing School in 1953. She ran her own convalescent home for nine years and then nursed in the public and private hospital systems for more than 20 years. (back cover)