Burbidge, Gwendolen Norah (Gwen) (1904 - 2000)

In 1935 Miss Burbidge passed with credit the Victorian Teachers College teaching course and Psychology at the University of Melbourne, and embarked for London for post-graduate study. She was there appointed Assistant Matron at St Thomas's and St James's Hospitals, and Second Assistant Matron at the Manchester Royal Infirmary. She was awarded the First Class Certificate for Sister Tutors, the Sister Tutors' Diploma and the Diploma of Nursing by the University of London. In 1938 she was elected a Fellow and Deputy Chairman of the Board of the Royal Victorian College of Nursing.
Miss Burbidge returned to Melbourne at the end of 1938 to take up the post of Matron of the Queen's Memorial Infectious Diseases Hospital, Fairfield, the first Australian hospital to deal exclusively with infectious disease. Fairfield Hospital at that time was an object of fear, regarded by the public as rather like a leper colony. Patients were delivered to the ambulance from back doors. Families did not visit the patients, whose only contact with people was with nurses swathed in masks and prophylactic uniforms. Loneliness and psychological distress inflicted enormous damage on patients, particularly the young. Nor were staff immune from the effects of the prevailing atmosphere. Matron Burbidge changed the treatment of the patients, the status and condition of the nurses and public attitude to infectious diseases. Twenty years later Sir Herbert Olney, Chairman of Fairfield Hospital Board of Management recorded her establishment of the Nurses Training School, her development of post graduate courses in infectious diseases and her introduction of public health courses. Sir Herbert recorded also Matron's introduction of nurses' graduation ceremonies, training films, occupational therapists, dieticians, specialist theatre units, mobile beds, modern equipment and public education. Uniquely for an infectious diseases hospital, routine visiting hours were established. Matron Burbidge introduced facilities for nurses of a kind later regarded as essential, including drying cupboards, clothes-washing machines, hairdressing facilities, recreational and private meeting areas. Stock control, inventories and hospital supply requirement routines were introduced, public address systems and labour efficient wards created. By 1948 the incidence of infectious disease in Victoria had improved to such an extent that the Act by which the hospital was constituted required amendment to permit vacant wards to be used for the treatment of general patients.

During the war years, Matron Burbidge was elected a member of the Royal College of Nursing of London. In 1942 she was appointed to chair a national conference to report upon the Control of Nursing in War. She was elected a member of the Nurses Registration Board of Victoria in 1944 and in 1946 was appointed by the Australian government to its Committee on Post-war Nursing Reconstruction.

In 1946 she was elected the inaugural President of the National Florence Nightingale Memorial Committee of Australia, serving in that office until 1948. During this time the Committee began to focus on establishing post-basic further educational opportunities for nurses in Australia. The Committee under Miss Burbidge's leadership strongly supported the establishment of a national college of nursing. Miss Burbidge chaired a subcommittee to bring this event about. The goal was achieved in 1949 with the establishment in Melbourne of the College of Nursing, Australia. Miss Burbidge was elected a Fellow of the College and became its first Censor-in-Chief, a position she held until 1960.

Miss Burbidge was Australia's representative at meetings of the Grand Council of the Florence Nightingale International Foundation in 1947, and Australia's representative to the International Congress of Nursing in Washington DC. In 1948 she was appointed to advise the Victorian Government on the formation of the Victorian Hospital Commission.

In 1948 she became the first Australian nurse to receive a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship, which allowed her to study nursing administration in the United States and Canada. In 1949 she was appointed Australian Representative to the International Council of Nurses and the following year received the Florence Nightingale Award for contribution to the nursing profession. In 1953 she was awarded the Queen's Coronation Medal. In 1954 she was appointed to the Nursing Committee of the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia and was elected a Councillor of the Royal Victorian College of Nursing. For many years she served as the President of the Airdrie Home for Aged and Incapacitated Nurses. In 1955 Miss Burbidge was awarded the Order of the British Empire for outstanding services to nursing. In 1960 she was elected the President of the College of Nursing, Australia.

Chronology

1936	Sister Tutor 1st Class Certificate received from the University of London
1938	Holiday Relief Sister in charge of Nurse’s Home and Maid’s Home and Second Assistant Matron at the Manchester Royal Infirmary, UK
1936	Pupil Housekeeper Course completed at Hospital Sukbletan?
1926 - 1929	Commenced nurse training at Royal Melbourne Hospital
1928	Completed Victorian Nurses Board Examination in Surgical Nursing with the highest marks in Victoria
1929	Received a General Nursing Certificate. Awarded Sister Madge Kelly Memorial Prize for Best Practical Nurse in the State
1929	Staff Nurse at Royal Melbourne Hospital
1929 - 1930	Pupil Obstetrics Nurse at the Women’s Hospital in Melbourne while on leave from Royal Melbourne Hospital
1930	Completed midwifery training at Women’s Hospital Melbourne
1930	Returned to Melbourne Hospital
1930	Received a Supply Certificate - Royal Melbourne Hospital, in charge of medical wards
1930	Sister-in-charge of Nurses Preliminary Training School
1930	Midwifery Certificate completed
1931	Health Visitor, School Nurse and Tuberculosis Visitor and Sanitary Inspector Certificates from the Royal Sanitary Institute
1933 - 1935	Sister Tutor at Alfred Hospital in Prahran, Victoria
1934	Lectures for Nurses - Approved text for General Nursing for Nurses at the Nurses and Masseurs Registration Board Queensland
1934	Founder and Head of the Preliminary Training School for Probationary Nurses at the Alfred Hospital, Victoria
1935 - 1935	Embarked for UK
1935	Senior Sister Tutor at the Alfred Hospital in Victoria - published 1st edition of Lectures for Nurses
1935	Principles and Methods of Teaching and Psychology completed at the University of Melbourne's Victorian Teachers’ College . Appointed Assistant Matron at St Thomas’ Hospital in London
1936	Assistant Matron at St James’ Hospital in London
1936	Arrived in London. Lived at 15 Kensington Park Gardens
1937	Sister Tutors Certificate, Sister Tutors Diploma and Diploma of Nursing completed at the University of London (St Thomas’ Hospital), UK
1938 - 1938	Completed seven months training with St Thomas’ Hospital, UK
1938 - 1938	Holiday Relief Sister for Lady Superintendent of Nurses at the Manchester Royal Infirmary in England. Also in charge of Nurses’ Home and Maids’ Home, acted as Second Assistant Matron
1938	Diploma in Nursing (Hospital Administration) whilst at Royal Infirmary in Manchester, UK
1938	Diploma of Nursing (Distinction) completed at the University of London. Appointed Matron at Queen’s Memorial Infectious Diseases Hospital in Fairfield, Victoria, Australia
1938 - 1939	Elected Fellow and Deputy Chairman of the Board of Royal Victorian College of Nursing
1938 - 1939	Elected Fellow and Deputy Chairman of the Board of Royal Victorian College of Nursing