ABSTRACT
Nursing has changed considerably over the last few decades. The traditional apprentice scheme of state registered nurse and state enrolled nurse trained over 3 years was changed to the Project 2000 course, which moved nurse training from a certificate entry to that of a Higher Education Diploma, educated in the university and no longer as paid workers in hospitals. One statement commonly heard is that ‘if only people could go back to the old days of matrons running hospitals then all would be well’. Departmental matrons experience similar types of conflicting demands upon them, many spending more time ‘counting beds’ to deal with bed pressures caused from patient flow through the hospital than providing the nursing leadership and supervision to their ward managers. The chief executive reports to the chair of the board who has the governance role for the organisation. Workforce planning in general for nursing has been at best chaotic over the last few decades.
