Nora Neve
Nora Neve was a British nurse and medical missionary with the Church Missionary Society who pioneered missionary nursing. Her work was instrumental in the development of the Kashmir Mission Hospital in Srinagar. She was the hospital's first Superintendent of Nursing and led education and cleanliness initiatives. Neve also recorded and published records of Kashmiri hospital practices in the American Journal of Nursing, contributing to the tool kits of other missionaries and preserving a part of Kashmir's cultural history.
Background
Early life and influences
Nora Neve was born in England in 1873. Her family members were devout Christians and members of the Church of England. Two of her uncles, Arthur Neve and Ernest Neve, were medical missionaries in Kashmir by the time she was 11 years old. At the young age of 18, Nora traveled to Kashmir to visit her uncles and see the mission hospital where they worked. She decided to join them and the Church Missionary Society and a year later, was officially announced as part of the society's ranks in the Church Missionary Gleaner July 1898 edition.Education
Neve was sent by CMS to The Olives, a training home where they sent women missionary candidates. There, she received her nursing and additional Christian religious education. At the time of her attendance, The Olives was only a 4 year old private training school in the post-Nightingale era, when nursing schools were established in England that focused on providing future nurses practical education, promoting sanitation and cleanliness practices, and on fostering nursing theory and professionalism.Missionary work
Neve left for Kashmir by sea in September or October 1898. She was supported financially by the church of St. Mary Abbots of Kensington.Kashmir Mission Hospital
Neve joined Ernest and Arthur Neve at the Kashmir Mission Hospital at Srinagar. The hospital was considered a modern, state of the art institution. It was known as far away as Balistan, more than 100 miles from Srinagar, from discharged patients who traveled and told others. Eventually, during Neve's time, it would grow to consist of 4 male doctors, 2 English nurses, and 120 hospital beds. In a year, they reported 22,735 new outpatients, 1,764 in patients, 5,038 surgical operations, with 15-18 operations on a busy day. The hospital also played a religious role and considered physical healing to be a vehicle to share the gospel, which they actively taught to patients. Neve shared this sentiment, expressing hope in an article she wrote for the American Journal of Nursing that increasing numbers of patients would be converted to Christianity.Leadership at the mission hospital
Neve was the Superintendent of Nursing at the Kashmir Missions Hospital. She was an indispensable part of the team developing the hospital; Ernest Neve said that without her, it would have broken down. He also credited her with the efficiency of the hospital, the strict cleanliness, and the disciplined decor, which she maintained through inspections on her daily rounds. Through these practices, she brought the Kashmir Mission Hospital to modern European standards based on the germ theory which had been developed only decades before.She was described as a kind and patient nurse and was known for teaching her patients as well as caring for their physical ailments, although she reported finding more success teaching young patients than older. She was especially in charge of the women's wards in the Sir Petrabh Signh Pavilion, as nursing care was done by those of the same gender as the patient. She also camped at sites beyond the hospital that were in great need to provide aid temporarily.
Neve led other nurses and staff at the hospital. Other nurses at the mission hospital who worked under her supervision include two English nurses, Lucy McCormick and H Smith, with visiting nurses helping during the busy summer months. She spent much of her time supervising eastern assistants, who were recorded to need more assistance because they lack "sense of duty".
Few government hospitals in Kashmir had a nurse on staff at this time, and Neve's necessary and innovative work served as an example for other hospitals in the region. In addition to the Mission Hospital, Neve worked the North India Leper Hospital, a government hospital.