I graduated from St. Mary's School of Nursing Montreal in 1968. It was an unique period in the history of nursing education. Nurses lived in residences, staffed the hospitals , and took on enormous clinical responsibilities beyond our years. In 1973, I did a Bachelor of Nursing in Public Health from McGill School of Nursing.
At the end of my studies at McGill, I was chosen to do a mini internship at the MGH to sharpen my clinical skills as I had applied to CUSO (Canadian University Services Overseas) right away upon graduation. CUSO offered me a posting in Tumaco, Colombia to set up public health programs. Tumaco was a very poor village on the Pacific coast, no running water, no toilets, deplorable housing( wooden shacks ) and the people were extremely undernourished. I stayed there almost 3 years. This was the the most significant time of my nursing career and an important personal life changing experience. I returned to Montreal fluent in Spanish. I got hired at CLSC CDN home visiting in a multicultural neighbourhood. At that time, I was able to provide all health services in Spanish to young refugee Latin American families, which included many single pregnant mothers, often alone, without any support systems. While president of the Conseil des Infirmières at the CLSC, I convinced the management of the need to use the McGill Nursing Model in all our day to day practise, a health, family, and community centred paradigm. Professor Helen Eizer from McGill taught all the nurses at the CLSC CDN the McGill model.
Interestingly, CLSC CDN was one of the first CLSCS to have a research Center. I submitted to the research Center a written proposal, to look at the impact of conjugal violence on the mental state of young children who witness it daily in their own homes. This research proposal received the largest funding ever. The findings changed practises. I do not think my nursing career would have provided all these clinical experiences without a degree in nursing from McGill. While there, I was lucky too to have taken the English course taught by Hugh MacLennan.
Lastly. I'd like to mention, since 2017 - 375th anniversary Ville de Montreal - I and 3 other nursing classmates from St.Mary's ( class of '68 ) have been working on a Montreal nursing sculpture project to honour the history of the profession and to underline the huge impact by ALL nurses on the health and well being of so many individuals and families. We raised $251,000 to hire a sculptor to create an outdoor work of art to celebrate nursing and all nurses. We had so many generous donors. Our 2 biggest donors were Sean Finn from CN, and Richard Ingram who has supported the McGill school of nursing and nursing research for years. We are very grateful to him for so generously supporting our project. It turned out RIchard Ingram was the head of the CUSO Latin American program a long time ago. I joined just after he left. Soon the Bureau d'art public will publicly announce the site for the nursing sculpture, launch the contest among the artists of which our jury will choose the finalist. Initially we thought the sculpture would be ready in 2020 to coincide with the 100th anniversary since the nursing profession was legally recognized. The timetable has been readjusted.
McGill and Nursing were important chapters in my personal and professional life.