DEVOTED DRUMQUIN NURSE REFLECTS ON CAREER SPANNING 38 YEARS
Devoted Drumquin nurse reflects on career spanning 38 years
After a career spanning some 38 years Drumquin woman, Mary Corrigan has taken early retirement from her nursing post with Sperrin Lakeland Health and Social Care Trust.
Her vocation and devotion to duty were celebrated at a function in Omagh's Silverbirch Hotel on Thursday, when a guest list of more than 60, comprised family, friends and colleagues paid tribute to her years of unstinting service to the local community.
A native of Castlederg, Mary was admitted to the caring profession in the 1960s through the nursing school then at Tyrone County Hospital, and she as spent the best part of working life at the 'County'.
However, when she decided to call it a day on December 13 last, Mary could also point to tours of duty at the former Derg Valley Hospital, where she undertook holiday and sick relief, and Omagh General Hospital.
"I took leave from the County in 1968 to have my family, and I returned to full-time nursing again in 1974 at the General. In between times I worked at the Derg Valley," she explained.
In 1967, the year that she qualified as a staff nurse, Mary married Jim Corrigan, currently a supervisor with the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development's Rivers Agency. The couple, who moved to Claramore about a mile from the village in September 1997, settled in Drumquin area.
There they had three daughters, Delma (Mrs. Terry McAleer, Cookstown), Monica (Mrs. Ciaran Owens, Sixmilecross) and Frances (Mrs. Gerard McLaughlin, Park. Co. Londonderry), who have given them two grandsons.
Mary, herself, was the eldest girl in a family of four daughters the others are Anne, Kathleen and Margaret and three sons, Frank, John and Gerard, born to the late Bartley and Teresa McGlynn.
Qualifying
She was educated at the local St. Patrick's Primary School in Castlederg and enrolled as a student nurse on June 17, 1963 after successfully taking the entrance examination. Since qualifying Mary has tended a variety of wards and departments at the County.
"I've worked on the children's ward, in Accident and Emergency, Gynae and in outpatients," she disclosed.
After my stint at the General I was posted to Ward 12 SRU [Stroke Rehabilitation Unit] in October 1976 and I was there until I finished."
But she was also required to work at the Erne Hospital in Enniskillen, Altnagelvin in Londonderry and at the Tyrone and Fermanagh Hospital in Omagh during the six months in 1985 that she did a 'care of the elderly' syllabus, just one of several key courses taken by Mary in her exhaustive career.
Also in 1985 she was named ward manager, a position that she held until her retirement, while in 1990 she became one of the County's three 'senior sisters', the staff who co-ordinate the hospital's weekly duty roster.
"That meant doubling up, but it also gave me the opportunity to visit all wards and departments, and to talk to staff and to patients, and to help resolve problems," Mary revealed.
"But nothing gave me greater pleasure or satisfaction than to see a stroke victim, especially a young patient, on my own ward taking great strides towards a complete recovery, to returning to their family and community and, eventually, to work."
Ward 12's location also cast Mary in the role of standby nurse for the admission of emergency cases by helicopter -the helipad is at the SRU backdoor, so to speak - and she has first hand knowledge of the County's emergency plan swinging into action on occasions before the terrible tragedy of the Omagh town centre bombing in August 1998.
'Helicopter crash'
"Probably the occasion that is clearest in my mind is preparing for casualties from a helicopter crash near Gortin," Mary recollected. "I believe the chopper had flown into a flock of birds and went down. We were expecting the worst but, thankfully, the worst never happened."
Reflecting on the August 15, 1998 atrocity, Mary remembered that she had been in England at the time and had returned to duty on the following Tuesday, three days after the explosion in Market Street.
"The pain was etched on the faces of patients and staff alike, and morale at the hospital was very low. Everyone was frightened and worried, and, because I was a fresh face on the wards, all the patients wanted to tell me their own personal stories," recounted Mary.
"Obviously I was coming at it from a different perspective, like a mother coming back into her home with her children wanting to bring her up to date with their day. I listened while the patients talked. It was a humbling experience."
Added Mary: "The vigilant attention to duty by staff in the days and weeks ahead as they tended to the injured gradually lifted the doom and gloom that had greeted me when I went back to work, but it was an event in the life of the hospital that will never be erased."
And Mary also recalled another sad occasion in her life, the tragic death of Dr. Anthony Pollock in an electrical accident.
"I worked with Dr. Pollock for some time, both at the General and on Ward 12. He was the consultant physician at the SRU when I was transferred there. I thought he was a brilliant man and his loss to the hospital and his family was a major blow," she said.
Good times
But through it all Mary claimed there had been many good times, and smiled: "It was a bad day that we didn't have a laugh at work, even in my earliest days as a student nurse when we would play tricks on each other. We would dress up one of the girls as a patient and then admit her to a ward manned by another student."
It is extremely unlikely, however, that Mary ever told of those escapades to the student nurses who have reason to thank her for the experience they gained when working on Ward 12.
"I worked closely with the school of nursing which is now based at Altnagelvin, and regularly helped trained student nurses on placement to the County. The students always seemed to enjoy their time with us, and the feedback I got from the school invariably referred to just how much they had learned on 12 SRU," stated Mary.
But Mary's actual experience goes way beyond the realms of nursing. For more than 20 years until 2000 she was an active member and former chairman of Drumquin Age Concern.
She also belonged to the village's Credit Union branch, and was a long-term committee member and sometime leader with Drumquin Youth Club in the 1970s and early 1980s.
Devotee
An avid reader, Mary enjoys thrillers and the romances of Catherine Cookson. She is a devotee of Emmerdale and Coronation Street and the vast range of televised quiz shows, particularly 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?', and she is so keen on a live play that she once appeared in the comedy, "Give Us A House".
"And when we put it on in Gortin I forgot my lines," grinned Mary, "but fortunately the late Sammy Gormley was in the scene and he covered up for me brilliantly. I also enjoy pub quizzes but I prefer to sit quietly in the background and watch them rather than take part."
Away from home, Mary visited the world famous St. Patrick's Day Parade in New York in the millennium year along with her husband, Jim, and daughters, Delma and Frances, and their husbands. While staying in Manhattan she took the opportunity to tour the ill-fated World Trade Centre.
Last year Mary and Jim went on a Mediterranean Cruise with her sister, Margaret, and Margaret's husband, Frankie Quinn, but now she says she is going to take it easy, put her feet up and enjoy life to the full.
Yet, in the next breath Mary admitted: "I enjoy a good walk and I'm learning to swim at the Campsie pool, although I'm making a poor job of it."
What's the betting that she will ultimately go in at the deep end?
After a career spanning some 38 years Drumquin woman, Mary Corrigan has taken early retirement from her nursing post with Sperrin Lakeland Health and Social Care Trust.
Her vocation and devotion to duty were celebrated at a function in Omagh's Silverbirch Hotel on Thursday, when a guest list of more than 60, comprised family, friends and colleagues paid tribute to her years of unstinting service to the local community.
A native of Castlederg, Mary was admitted to the caring profession in the 1960s through the nursing school then at Tyrone County Hospital, and she as spent the best part of working life at the 'County'.
However, when she decided to call it a day on December 13 last, Mary could also point to tours of duty at the former Derg Valley Hospital, where she undertook holiday and sick relief, and Omagh General Hospital.
"I took leave from the County in 1968 to have my family, and I returned to full-time nursing again in 1974 at the General. In between times I worked at the Derg Valley," she explained.
In 1967, the year that she qualified as a staff nurse, Mary married Jim Corrigan, currently a supervisor with the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development's Rivers Agency. The couple, who moved to Claramore about a mile from the village in September 1997, settled in Drumquin area.
There they had three daughters, Delma (Mrs. Terry McAleer, Cookstown), Monica (Mrs. Ciaran Owens, Sixmilecross) and Frances (Mrs. Gerard McLaughlin, Park. Co. Londonderry), who have given them two grandsons.
Mary, herself, was the eldest girl in a family of four daughters the others are Anne, Kathleen and Margaret and three sons, Frank, John and Gerard, born to the late Bartley and Teresa McGlynn.
Qualifying
She was educated at the local St. Patrick's Primary School in Castlederg and enrolled as a student nurse on June 17, 1963 after successfully taking the entrance examination. Since qualifying Mary has tended a variety of wards and departments at the County.
"I've worked on the children's ward, in Accident and Emergency, Gynae and in outpatients," she disclosed.
After my stint at the General I was posted to Ward 12 SRU [Stroke Rehabilitation Unit] in October 1976 and I was there until I finished."
But she was also required to work at the Erne Hospital in Enniskillen, Altnagelvin in Londonderry and at the Tyrone and Fermanagh Hospital in Omagh during the six months in 1985 that she did a 'care of the elderly' syllabus, just one of several key courses taken by Mary in her exhaustive career.
Also in 1985 she was named ward manager, a position that she held until her retirement, while in 1990 she became one of the County's three 'senior sisters', the staff who co-ordinate the hospital's weekly duty roster.
"That meant doubling up, but it also gave me the opportunity to visit all wards and departments, and to talk to staff and to patients, and to help resolve problems," Mary revealed.
"But nothing gave me greater pleasure or satisfaction than to see a stroke victim, especially a young patient, on my own ward taking great strides towards a complete recovery, to returning to their family and community and, eventually, to work."
Ward 12's location also cast Mary in the role of standby nurse for the admission of emergency cases by helicopter -the helipad is at the SRU backdoor, so to speak - and she has first hand knowledge of the County's emergency plan swinging into action on occasions before the terrible tragedy of the Omagh town centre bombing in August 1998.
'Helicopter crash'
"Probably the occasion that is clearest in my mind is preparing for casualties from a helicopter crash near Gortin," Mary recollected. "I believe the chopper had flown into a flock of birds and went down. We were expecting the worst but, thankfully, the worst never happened."
Reflecting on the August 15, 1998 atrocity, Mary remembered that she had been in England at the time and had returned to duty on the following Tuesday, three days after the explosion in Market Street.
"The pain was etched on the faces of patients and staff alike, and morale at the hospital was very low. Everyone was frightened and worried, and, because I was a fresh face on the wards, all the patients wanted to tell me their own personal stories," recounted Mary.
"Obviously I was coming at it from a different perspective, like a mother coming back into her home with her children wanting to bring her up to date with their day. I listened while the patients talked. It was a humbling experience."
Added Mary: "The vigilant attention to duty by staff in the days and weeks ahead as they tended to the injured gradually lifted the doom and gloom that had greeted me when I went back to work, but it was an event in the life of the hospital that will never be erased."
And Mary also recalled another sad occasion in her life, the tragic death of Dr. Anthony Pollock in an electrical accident.
"I worked with Dr. Pollock for some time, both at the General and on Ward 12. He was the consultant physician at the SRU when I was transferred there. I thought he was a brilliant man and his loss to the hospital and his family was a major blow," she said.
Good times
But through it all Mary claimed there had been many good times, and smiled: "It was a bad day that we didn't have a laugh at work, even in my earliest days as a student nurse when we would play tricks on each other. We would dress up one of the girls as a patient and then admit her to a ward manned by another student."
It is extremely unlikely, however, that Mary ever told of those escapades to the student nurses who have reason to thank her for the experience they gained when working on Ward 12.
"I worked closely with the school of nursing which is now based at Altnagelvin, and regularly helped trained student nurses on placement to the County. The students always seemed to enjoy their time with us, and the feedback I got from the school invariably referred to just how much they had learned on 12 SRU," stated Mary.
But Mary's actual experience goes way beyond the realms of nursing. For more than 20 years until 2000 she was an active member and former chairman of Drumquin Age Concern.
She also belonged to the village's Credit Union branch, and was a long-term committee member and sometime leader with Drumquin Youth Club in the 1970s and early 1980s.
Devotee
An avid reader, Mary enjoys thrillers and the romances of Catherine Cookson. She is a devotee of Emmerdale and Coronation Street and the vast range of televised quiz shows, particularly 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?', and she is so keen on a live play that she once appeared in the comedy, "Give Us A House".
"And when we put it on in Gortin I forgot my lines," grinned Mary, "but fortunately the late Sammy Gormley was in the scene and he covered up for me brilliantly. I also enjoy pub quizzes but I prefer to sit quietly in the background and watch them rather than take part."
Away from home, Mary visited the world famous St. Patrick's Day Parade in New York in the millennium year along with her husband, Jim, and daughters, Delma and Frances, and their husbands. While staying in Manhattan she took the opportunity to tour the ill-fated World Trade Centre.
Last year Mary and Jim went on a Mediterranean Cruise with her sister, Margaret, and Margaret's husband, Frankie Quinn, but now she says she is going to take it easy, put her feet up and enjoy life to the full.
Yet, in the next breath Mary admitted: "I enjoy a good walk and I'm learning to swim at the Campsie pool, although I'm making a poor job of it."
What's the betting that she will ultimately go in at the deep end?
Further Information
Publisher: TYRONE CONSTITUTION
Ref: TC/1029
Published Date: 28-Feb-02
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