Among the reasons given by a writer in the BJN 100 years ago as to why nurses should be regulated was the following list of wrong doings. The incidents of rough handling by nurses seems the most bizarre. '1. A deliberate lie, told by a nurse, the direct result of "which was the death from an operation of a patient. 2. The administration by a nurse of opium to a young infant. Death of infant. 3. Neglect of a case of severe haemorrhage because the nurse 'did not like to wake the house surgeon'. Result, death. 4. Turning on of a hot water tap in the bath. Scalding and consequent death of patient. 5. Refusal to report to the doctor a doubtful case. Death from typhoid of the patient. 6. Roughness in bed making. Immediate death of the patient from heart attack. 7. Roughness, despite remonstrance, in moving a patient for the bed-pan. Death within ten minutes from haemorrhage. 8. Death of a delirious-not lunatic-patient from drinking a poisonous lotion left standing in the ward. Nurse absent. 9. Neglect of aseptic precautions in child-birth. Death of the mother from sepsis. 10. Suicide of a lunatic under the nurse's eyes, with the nurse's own scissors left beside the patient despite the suicidal mania being known.'
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