Nurse ! I Want My Mummy
When a child is ill in hospital, a parent's first reaction is to be 1 them.
Most hospitals now allow parents to sleep 2with their child，providing a bed or sofa on the ward.
But until the 1970s this 3 was not only frowned upon —it was actively discouraged.
Staff worried that the children were upset when their parents 4 , and so there was a blanket ban.
A concerned nurse, Pamela Hawthorn, disagreed and her study "Nurse! want my mummy", published in 1974, 5 the face of paediatric nursing.
Professor Martin Johnson, professor of nursing at the University of Salford, said that the work of 6 like Pamela had changed the face of patient care.
"Pamela's study was done against the 7 of a lively debate in paediatrics and psychology as to the degree women should spend with children in the outside world and the degree to which they should be allowed to visit children in 8 .
"The idea was that if mum came to 9a small child in hospital the child would be upset and inconsolable for hours.
"Yet the nurse noticed that if mum did not come at10the child stayed in a relatively stable state but they might be depressed.
"Of course we know now that they had almost, given 11 hope that mum was ever coming back.
"To avoid a little bit of pain they said that no one should visit.
"But children were alone, and 12, so Hawthorn said parents should be allowed to visit.
Dr Peter Carter, chief executive and general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, said her 13had been seminal.
"Her research put an end to the14 when parents handed their children over to strangers at the door of the hospital ward.
"As a result of her work, parents and carers are now recognized as partners in care and are 15 the opportunity to stay with their children while they are in hospital, which has dramatically improved both parents' and children's experience of care. "
