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Coping with PD More than just a job
More than just a Job
While PDNS Margaret Richardson (Mags) is based at the General Hospital in Limerick, she estimates that about half of her time is spent visiting patients in their homes, which she says makes it easier to assess their condition than when seeing them at the clinics.
Dr. Helena Moore, a neurologist based in Tralee, holds two clinics at the hospital each month, but has had to close her patient lists in Limerick because of pressure of numbers. Mags says that “we really need a full-time neurologist in this area, adding that it was all about “meeting the needs of patients and carers.”
Mags started work as a Parkinson’s Disease Nurse Specialist (PDNS) in 2002, and she sees patients in Limerick, North Tipperary and parts of Clare. Originally trained as a general nurse and midwife, she had worked in male and female medical wards and had met a lot of people with Parkinson’s, which is where her interest began.
Those who attend the clinic meet Mags, and two or three weeks later she will see them in their own homes. She completes an assessment of the patient on his/her first visit, and will evaluate the need for Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy or Speech and Language Therapy. Mags says she herself can refer the patients on for this. Her work also takes her to retirement homes and day care centres.
“We identify problems and seek solutions,” says Mags. She adds that “sometimes talking, just understanding, is all that is needed”.
If she does not know the answer, she “will go away and find it”, and says she is “a link between the patient and the health professional.
The day starts at 8am, and should finish at 4.30pm, but Mags says this is subject to circumstances!
Mags says that the health services are sadly lacking , with gaps left between the hospital and the community, which she attempts to bridge for the approximately 680 patients in the Midwest. Many patients do not have a consultant, attending their GP locally. Many GPs indicated in a survey published in the late 1980s in the Irish Medical Times, that Parkinson’s was the one disease they felt least able to diagnose.
Mags stated that the most frequently asked question had to do with medications, and problems with medications.
“I would love to see all those working in multidisciplinary care teams do the PDNS course”, as this would greatly help their understanding of the complexities of Parkinson’s. Mags would also like to see each neurologist have a PDNS on their team, and enough neurologists so all patients would have access to specialist care. “If we had a network of PDNS throughout the country, the quality of life of people with Parkinson’s would be transformed”, she added.
Mags also runs meetings where she organises a health professional speaker, and is available at these meetings to answer any questions patients and carers might have , where they can obtain information about their medication, or ask for advice.
Half funded by the local Health Board, with the balance coming from the Limerick Branch, Mags is one of three PDNS in the country, and patient feedback has been universally positive, even ecstatic! A Parkinson's patient, Florence Lynch, echoes this statement, and professes herself delighted as a patient with the new support system now in place.
Pauline does fifteen hours of secretarial work for Mags per week - very much needed, as Mags says when she started work as a PDNS, the paperwork alone took a few hours each day, which Pauline now handles, thus increasing the time Mags spends with patients.
PDNS Mags Richardson talked to Ann Keilthy. TOP
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