A specialist support worker who was the first in her role in the country is preparing to hang up her uniform for the last time.
Deb Hobson, from Ramsgate, started training as a nurse in 1978, but never qualified as she left to have her children.
After working in nursing homes and as a carer, she returned to the wards in 2000, before moving into a role as a specialist stoma support healthcare assistant (HCA).
She said: “It was my dream role, and I have loved it, and learnt so much about people.
“I was the first HCA to do this job and after I spoke about it at a conference, the chief nursing officer for England asked for the job description, and now it is all over the country.
“I don ‘t regret not finishing nursing training because the higher up you go, the less patient contact you get. This is the job I wanted, and it has been a privilege to make people feel better and less scared.”
Training and first role
Deb, 66, trained in Canterbury and lived in nurses’ accommodation in Ethelbert Road. Her first role was on Mitchell and Spooner wards at Nunnery Fields Hospital.
She said: “We wore the black cape with the red silk lining, and the paper hat, and we weren’t allowed a hair out of place.
“I did really feel like a nurse. We had such a laugh at times, but we were so scared of matron. There was only one matron then but she seemed to be everywhere!
“I can still remember the very first patient I looked after, a lady with dementia. She had everything out of her locker and was refusing to go to bed, and told me she was waiting for a train.
“Instinctively I went along with it, and I told her she had missed it, but she could stop with us overnight and get the train in the morning.
“Within five or 10 minutes I was getting her in bed, and I’ve carried that approach all the way through.
“I always treat people like humans, because that is all we are.”
Deb also worked on Clark ward at K&C, which was then a male orthopaedic ward. There were a lot of younger men who were in hospital for weeks in traction for broken legs.
She said: “Apart from their broken bones, they were otherwise well, and they spent all day making me blush!
“But we really got to know them and two of them came to my wedding a year later with their own wives.”
Switching roles
Although reports from her clinical supervisors were overwhelmingly positive, Deb was struggling academically so switched to a pupil nurse role. She then worked in Ramsgate hospital and the Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother (QEQM) Hospital in Margate, on Cheerful Sparrows and the children’s ward.
After having her children, she worked in nursing homes and then as a carer, before returning to QEQM in 2000 through NHS Professionals, working as a healthcare assistant across the hospital. In 2002 she joined the team on Cheerful Sparrows as a permanent member of staff.
Her younger daughter Gemma also became a nurse and the pair worked together, until Gemma was tragically diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer and died two years later, aged just 30, in 2013.
Deb said: “Losing Gemma taught me so much about life and what people have to go through.
“When I went back to work a few months after she died, my first patient was a young girl with breast cancer and I just couldn’t do it.
“But one of the stoma nurses was going on maternity leave and I was asked to cover her role, and Gail Tasker, the lead nurse for stoma care, really took me under her wing.”
Deb remained with the team and attended a range of specialist training courses to develop her skills. She cares for people immediately after they have been fitted with a stoma bag, whether as an emergency or as part of cancer treatment.
She said: “Sometimes I tell them about Gemma, and help them take it a day at a time. None of us know what is around the corner.
“Having me on the team frees up the nurses for clinics and home visits. If someone needs an hour of my time they can have it.
“I’m going to miss caring for people, and my colleagues as I have made some really lovely friends.”
Deb plans to travel, including a visit to an elephant sanctuary, to enjoy her garden, and hopes to volunteer, including setting up a meditation group. Her last day is Friday, 24 July.
