LYNETTE Richards-Lorde is one of those persons who have never forgotten her home-country Guyana regardless of the fact that she has always found herself immersed in activities in the United Kingdom, a place she has called her home for nearly 60 years.

“I was born at 47 Palm Street, Werk-en-Rust, Georgetown to loving Christian parents. My father, John Richards, was the Manager for Bourda Market and my mother, Beatrice Dora Richards was a dress designer and seamstress,” Lorde told the Pepperpot Magazine.

She explained that in her family she had one older sister, Nan and two brothers – Owen and Vincent. Her parents, she said were keen on enabling their children to have a good education and also provided them opportunities to take music and art lessons. For music, Lorde said that she attained a Grade Four pianoforte and for art, she was able to do paintings that she exhibited and sold.

THREE CHOICES
Lorde said that her head teacher told the students that there were only three choices of careers available after senior Cambridge. The three choices were nursing, teaching or the civil service. She said that she wanted to do nursing in Guyana but the waiting list was long.

“I decided to work as a civil servant with the Ministry of Health in Brickdam and at the Georgetown Hospital as a secretary to the Radiographer. This was after I had completed my high school education at Tutorial High School and art education at Queen’s College with E.R.Burrowes as her tutor,” she stated.

SAILED ON ORANJESTAD

Lorde told the Pepperpot Magazine that her father suggested that as she was only 19 years of age at the time, she should save up her money and take her sister with her to the United Kingdom.

“I did just that; I saved up my fare – £100, which was $480 Guyanese dollars in 1959 and we travelled together to England on the Oranjestad in February 1959. We sailed from Georgetown and arrived in the heart of the English winter three weeks later at Plymouth. It was a wonderful experience, seeing places such as Surinam, Trinidad and Madeira on our way to England,” she said.

She said that her sister was accepted to work as a nursing assistant at Oxford, and she was accepted for training as a state registered nurse (SRN) in Taunton and Somerset Hospital. “My main aim was to become a midwife, my father’s dream. I wanted to qualify as a nurse-midwife and return home after five years.”

STATE REGISTERED NURSE
At the completion of my State Registered Nurse training, Lorde was awarded the prize for the best practical nurse of the year (1962) and went to Cheltenham and to Birmingham to train as a midwife in the hospital and the community. “On successfully completing my formal training I returned home to Guyana to see my parents and if possible to work there. There were some political problems at the time and my father advised me to return to the UK and come back later. On return, I got married and my daughter was born the following year.”

Lorde told of her experiences as a district midwife; training as a clinical teacher to student midwives in the community; and as a Nursing Officer responsible for all antenatal and gynecology services and staff at the Greenwich District Hospital. She further worked as the Senior Nursing Officer, in charge of three hospitals, the Weir, the South London Hospital for Women, and the St George’s maternity unit.

DIVISIONAL NURSING OFFICER

“After six months in the post of Senior Nursing Officer, my immediate boss informed me she was leaving her post as Divisional Nursing officer, the top Midwifery post in the Wandsworth Health Authority,” she said. “I never expected to be considered for this post, but the health authority told me they were pleased with the way I worked and I should apply for the post. I applied, was interviewed and I was appointed. I then became the adviser on midwifery services to the health authority and supervisor of all midwives working in Wandsworth in 1979.”

Lorde said that she was also appointed as a director for Maternity Alliance, UK, an organisation which advised the UK government’s select committee on midwifery services and care.

CONTINUITY OF CARE
Later, Lorde was introduced to the subject of ‘Continuity of care’ for mothers; a suggestion that was accepted and adopted as a good care model for maternity services. At the same time, she became chairman for the association of supervisors of midwives in 1989 for the south-east region of UK. She said that she then became the first nurse-midwife to be appointed to the general manager responsible for medical, nursing, clerical and technical staff. In so doing, she was able to introduce effective care for all general, midwifery and all children services.
After a successful career, Lorde took early retirement in 1992.

VOLUNTARY WORK

The experienced health worker was one of the founder members and chairman of the Association of Guyanese Nurses and Allied Professionals (AGNAP) that was formed in the UK in 1989.

“We felt we were in a position to give our services and resources to our home. We are now in our 30th year, and over the years we have provided training and helped develop services such as cancer care, sickle cell and thalassaemia, audiology services and palliative. We also supplied theatre instruments, walking frames and setting children’s library in hospital,” she posited.

She further explained that from 1993 to 2005 she undertook training as children’s advocate with children’s organisations and also worked as an advocate for children who lived in Homes and represented them in schools and in courts, giving them a voice in society.

COMMITTEE OF EXPERTS
By 1999 the Department of Health appointed her to represent the UK as a member of a committee of experts to serve in Stratsburg in Europe. The committee was termed Adaptation of Healthcare Services. Almost simultaneously she was appointed as Director for the Commonwealth Society for the Deaf (now Soundseekers).

“This was as a result of my visit to Guyana where I found that there was no service for people with hearing disabilities. I sought the opinion of the then Minister of Health to find out if I could seek help in the UK. This was agreed and my appointment as director was mainly to help with fundraising for providing a comprehensive hearing service in my home Guyana. We sought funding from the Lottery in the UK and the fundraising made of £250,000, she said.

Project 2000 was conceived and a fully comprehensive service comprising of a doctor, nurses and technicians to make hearing mounds and a 4×4 vehicle to take the service over the whole country were all provided. Many Guyanese with a hearing problem benefited from this service, Lorde stated.

FEEDING PROGRAMME
On a visit to her mother’s home village of Beterverwagting on the East Coast in 2005, Lorde said the medical officer in the area told her of children who were having some problems, going to school with just sugared water for breakfast and no lunch. This, she said was confirmed by the then head teacher.

“On my return to the UK, I discussed this matter with AGNAP and also with the Soroptimist International club, for which I had become the president. Help was given. Funds were raised. Links with the head teacher of the B/V school and the parent-teachers group were made. I returned to B/V three months later and funds were provided to prepare meals and for breakfast for 30 children. After six months, Food for the Poor took over the funding of the project.

As a result of members of Soroptimists knowing of the BV school, a school in Catford contacted her offering fiction and nonfiction books. Over 5,000 books were donated and sent to the school, so a small library for children and parents were formed. Ten computers were also donated by an Inner Wheel Croydon member. This enabled the B/V children to link with children in a school in Croydon to exchange messages.

COMMONWEALTH COUNTRIES LEAGUE (CCL)

Lorde is a member of the Commonwealth Countries League (CCL), an organisation that provides bursaries for girls of the Commonwealth, who are ready for secondary education. The fund enables children to have uniform, books, travel, especially where parents are going through financial difficulties. The funds are provided to the school so that they can be properly accounted for. “Over the past 20 years, I have managed to provide many bursaries to Guyanese girls, children from Jamaica and South Africa,” she said.

She is also known as a champion within the diabetes community, doing work in the UK, as well as in Guyana. “I became interested in diabetes because it is a condition affecting members of my family and many friends. I was offered training to become a diabetes community champion. For the past eight years, I have been actively engaged in communities in the UK, in teaching people how to prevent becoming diabetic. This involves going to schools, workplaces, colleges, railway stations and having a stall in my local market, where I display information and answers questions from the public,” she stated. (mercilinburke2017@gmail.com)