Army - The Soldiers' Newspaper

Sister Jeffrey helps lift an injured soldier’s morale by holding a shaving mirror – Papua New Guinea.
Photo provided by RAANC

Sr Gould, founder of the nursing corps, during the Boer War. Photo provided by RAANC

A group of former Army nurses get taken for a ride during this year’s Anzac Day march.
Photos provided RAANC

Members of the IRR medical team run through drills in full protective dress.
Photo by Capt Jason Logue, AAPRS

A nurse assists a hospitalised soldier in Papua New Guinea, 1943

Then Capt Judith Spence in Rwanda.
Photos provided by RAANC

An Army and Air Force nurse are reunited after being PWs during WW2.
Photo provided by the Nursing Corps

Selfless service

By Lt Kate Almond
The Incident Response Regiment (IRR) was created in 2002 in response to the growing threat of terrorism.

The unit had its origins in the JIRU (Joint Incident Response Unit) – formed to provide chemical, biological and radiological (CBR) defence support to the Sydney Olympics.

When JIRU was disbanded, an interim CBR capability was maintained in the form of CBR Response Squadron – which has evolved into part of today’s IRR along with the Emergency Response Squadron.

The IRR is now part of the Special Operations Command and has an ongoing support role, also providing specialist capabilities for other situations where required.

Functions of the unit include search, decontamination, threat reduction, emergency response and medical support – of which nursing is an integral part.

As a nursing officer within IRR there is a requirement to undertake specialist CBR medical training, which allows one to deal with CBR casualties, conventional casualties or a combination of these.

A comprehensive knowledge of CBR agents and their physiological effects as well as the therapeutic regimes involved for each agent is paramount to the nursing officer’s (NO) role.

The level of understanding of the treating NO significantly influences medical management of these casualties. The CBR environment mandates a unique medical support arrangement not found in other ADF units.

The NO is heavily relied on during operations for a number of tasks not normally experienced in conventional military medical practice.

They may have to take on the responsibilities of on-site medical commander while the medical officer is involved in concurrent activity. This may involve liaison with other medical elements, whether they be military or civilian.

In lieu of the MO, the NO will have to provide advice to the team leader, act as triage officer in the clean area, and, as such, coordinate the egress of casualties.

This requires a detailed knowledge of CBR agents/triage/mass casualty management and decontamination procedures.

The NO will be the POC for the retrieval medic teams who are deployed forward into the contaminated area and assist in coordinating their activities.

This implies dexterity with comms and triage considerations in a contaminated environment.

Other training includes protective dress drills, live agent training and conventional military training.

It is essential that all elements within the team have an intimate understanding of each other’s roles in order to operate effectively.

In conjunction with this, consideration must be given to the environments in which one may be required to work.

The environments to which we may be exposed are not conventional, and the wearing of protective dress increases the amount of physical and psychological stress in conjunction with being cumbersome, limiting vision and reducing dexterity.

It is also essential as the treatment of CBR or combined casualties can be extremely different to the treatment of conventional casualties, which we are familiar with.

As a part of the team we are also required to deploy all over the state and country to participate in jobs and exercises with a variety of other units and also civilian agencies, such as ambulance, police and fire.

Another part of the role we play as nursing officers within the unit is providing training and education to other units within Army and to other services within Defence.

It is an exciting and challenging role that I am glad I have been given the opportunity to be a part of, since it is an experience that I would never get as a civilian or as a nursing officer in any other unit.

By Susan Oldroyd
WO2 Norma Hinchcliffe enlisted on August 13, 1981 and is proud to be one of the seven remaining ORs in the Royal Australian Army Nursing Corps (RAANC).

WO2 Hinchcliffe is a recipient of the Alice Appleford Memorial Nursing Award, a CSM for service in Cambodia, and the Humanitarian Overseas Service Medal from the Great Lakes District East Africa with CARE Australia.

“I am very honoured to still be wearing the nursing corps embellishments, as many of my colleagues transferred to medical corps in 1986,” she said.

WO2 Hinchcliffe’s first postings were to camp hospitals (now medical centres) and military hospitals (now Health Support Battalions).

Her most memorable experiences include a posting to the RAP at the School of Infantry, in Singleton in 1991.

“The posting to RAP at Singleton gave me exposure to the infantry and the hard training they did.

“I used to always dread the Saturday nights. We had five beds in our treatment area and every bed would have a broken soldier, either with bloodied faces, noses, jaws or vomiting. You were there just by yourself – that was pretty challenging – never a quiet Saturday night.”

“If somebody came in drunk overnight, I’d get their soiled linen put it in a garbage bag and tell them to take it away, wash it and bring it back to me clean.”

In 1993 WO2 Hinchcliffe was chosen to go to Cambodia as part of the United Nations Transitional Authority Cambodia (UNTAC), where she received a CSM for her work with street children and working as a medical administrator.

“I was heavily involved with looking after street children – treating their wounds and helping them with their schooling.”

During her long service leave from the ADF, WO2 Hinchcliffe continued her nursing work overseas in Africa, where she worked as a field representative in a refugee camp with CARE Australia in 1996 and returned as the project manager for a mobile health clinic with CARE USA in 1999.

“Without my administration and logistics skills I learnt in the military, I could not have done the job. It would have been impossible.”

WO2 Hinchcliffe is currently employed as the Business Manager for the Defence Occupational Health & Safety Project at Brindabella Park in Canberra.

“I think it should be remembered that nurses have been out there, doing it in the field, since the Boer War. All nurses should be recognised, as they are the quiet achievers.”