Oral History Gallery

Routines at sea 10 - Treatment of NBC contaminated casualities

Claire Taylor

Service: 1968 - 1997

Rate: QARNNS Matron-in-Chief and Tri-Service Director of Nurse Education

Claire joined the QARNNS (Queen Alexandra Royal Naval Nursing Service) in 1967 as a State Registered Nurse and State Certified Midwife. She worked at Royal Naval Hospital M'Tarfa in Malta, RNH Haslar and HMS Ganges until 1973 when she left the service to work in Papua New Guinea.

On rejoining in 1975 she became a Sister Tutor and undertook a number of teaching posts primarily at RN Medical Services School Haslar. In 1987 she was appointed to the new Tri-Service body at MoD in London. During the Gulf War she was based in London as Deputy Matron-in-Chief. In 1994, she became Matron-in-Chief, together with the post (in 1996) of Tri-Service Director of Nurse Education.

How would medical staff treat a casualty who has been exposed to nuclear, biological or chemical contaminents?

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Extract Text (Duration 1.14)

It would depend on the situation.Â If a frontline person was injured the assessment of the situation would be whoever was there, which would probably be a Medical Assistant, and as I say the important thing is decontamination, so that you would put a dressing firmly on any wound, decontaminate the patient, get them into a clean environment, decontaminate the wound, and then you could actually start the definitive treatment.Â If there were a large scale problem then the medical facilities would be in what's known as a citadel, a self-contained unit that could be kept free from contamination, and that would be where the definitive treatment would carry... be carried out.