Health Ministry, Permanent Secretary, Dr. Diana Atwine broke down when called to give a speech at this year’s annual nurses dinner at Hotel Africana.

The first of its kind, all nurses and midwives from across the country were mobilized by a self appointed Committee led by a nurse from Mengo Hospital called Jennifer. 

The idea was to create one unique event every year where the nurses and midwives can meet, greet, talk amongst themselves and their leaders, wine and dine together. 

This would be an opportunity for this special class of health workers who spend the biggest amount of their working and personal time at the health centres trying to save lives. 

Their idea was that if their different leaders had failed to make this happen, they had to do it themselves.

When it came to time for Atwiine to give her speech, she broke down with strong emotions and cried for her first two to three minutes at the pulpit. 

She was speechless.

This is said to have been steered by the earlier speeches from some of the nurses that highlighted the many challenges that they go through on a daily basis as the try to save lives. 

These ranged from very low pay which have made many of them struggle with debts as they do not even have enough time to run any side businesses for survival like the doctors. 

Other challenges highlighted also included accumulated fatigue, stress and trauma from the many challenging medical cases they have to deal with everyday with little or no time for rest.

When she gained the courage to speak, she apologetically explained her tears as having been caused by the affection she has for nurses and midwives for the great sacrifice they have always offered at the wards. 

Service

She acknowledged the challenges of the nurses and concluded that just like their anthem says, “Nurses are called by God to serve”; no amount of pay would match their contribution to the world.

“When I was doing my medical internship in Nsambya Hospital, I practically learnt more about sacrifice by a health worker from these nurses at the wards. As a student doctor, I remember I got corrections from the nurses at the ward on many other things that I would be doing wrong in my first days of practice. I also used to admire the nurses for their smartness in those nice uniforms but also commitment to duty,” said Atwiine.

“A doctor would just come and give a prescription and go but who would bathe the patients and change their dirty linen? Who would look at the watch full night to make sure the patient doesn’t miss his or her dose? Who would stand the blood, pus and all sorts of fluids from accident victims straight from the reception to the time they leave the hospital?” she asked as the rest of the members responded in a single calm tone that, “a nurse”.

She applauded the organizers of the event for having thought so hard to create this platform not only for unity but also interaction between the different ages of nurses and midwives. 

She says she broke down when she looked at the young nurses that have just joined service and then the old nurses that she grew up seeing in Nsambya, Mengo, Mulago and other Hospitals and wished that these interact more so that the young ones pick on from the elderly the values of selflessness, commitment, dedication and service above self which are the foundation upon which nursing was found. 

“This way, the new nurses would replace the old nurses and we would not loose those great values from the profession,” she emphasized.