Celebrating 95-year-old volunteer Joyce Standring’s career!

It’s been a tale of two careers for Joyce Standring as she stands down this year from her voluntary role at the trust at the grand age of 95.

Joyce began her healthcare career in January 1948, six months before the NHS was even born, and after taking on a huge variety of roles, she began a long stint in volunteering at Musgrove Park Hospital – clocking up over 30 years altogether.

“Recently I’ve been busy writing my memoirs for my grandchildren, who’ve been asking me to do this for a long time,” says Joyce. “In fact, there’s so much that it’s turned out to be a rather thick booklet!”

While we’re celebrating Joyce’s volunteering career, it would be remiss of us not to take a look back at her working life, taking her to no less than three continents altogether!

“My career in nursing actually began six months prior to the introduction of the NHS,” she says.

“In fact, I knew at five years old that I wanted to go into nursing, and I was 11 when the Second World War began, so I joined the Red Cross as the first cadet-type young person ever – there hadn’t been anyone in this sort of role before and it was my first taste of volunteering!

“During the war I went to the local hospital every Saturday to spend time in the children’s ward, where I was a bit of a general dog’s body!

“When I turned 17, I told my parents that I wanted to be a nurse, to which my father laughed as he thought I’d simply faint at the sight of blood!

“Eventually I applied to the former Watford Peace Memorial Hospital and my aunt, who was a matron at Hill End Hospital, had been talking to the matron in Watford and I was accepted for training – a naughty thing to have happened, but I’m very pleased anyway.

“Having gained my S.R.N. qualification I worked on night duty until my parents decided that they were going to emigrate to New Zealand in 1952, where I became a theatre sister, specialising in cardiothoracic surgery, which was very new in those days.

“When we moved back to England, I worked for a short time on a medical ward in the Redhill and Hastings hospitals, before taking on a similar role with the Iraq Petroleum Company, which posted me to a company hospital in Qatar for ex-pats and local employees.

“In Qatar I specialised in low-risk midwifery, although the more complex expatriate employees’ wives were sent back to the UK or USA.

“When the company moved to Bahrain I became a midwife in the government hospital as married women were not employed by the oil company.

“The company then re-located to Abu Dhabi to their newly built residential camp for their developing oilfield, where I was asked by the British Embassy ambassador if I would consider working with the newly appointed director of health to set up a new hospital (one had not existed previously).

“This ended up with me developing my own clinic, where I treated all the women and children separately from the male patients and doctor, whereas previously the men would go to the doctor and tell them about their wife or daughter’s health needs!

“After returning to the UK in 1972 with the family, I came to MPH, where I joined the education department gaining my RCNT certificate.

“In 1976 we moved to Hemel Hempstead as my husband joined a firm as an oil consultant and I then became an infection control nurse working in a London hospital. A nurse working alongside microbiologists, haematologists and other path lab colleagues was a relatively new introduction.

“In 1980 I applied to Somerset Health Authority for a director of nursing services post for the area covering Bridgwater, and the community hospitals from Burnham-on-Sea down to Minehead, and the community nursing services covered those areas as well.

“After that I returned to MPH in the education department again and created several courses for end-of-life care, and a return to nursing, so I was teaching as well. Then I went into the senior management side of things, based out of County Hall, where I stayed until I retired.”

It was 30 years ago when Joyce’s “second career” as a volunteer began. Managers at MPH put a call out for someone to go around and check that all the patient information and leaflets were in date, and from that she reviewed leaflets as they were written by various teams across the hospital.

“It became clear to me that some of the leaflets weren’t written in plain English, which made it difficult for some patients to understand,” Joyce continues. “My role involved checking this from a member of the public’s perspective, which I did for many years.

“I was very involved with the hospital’s care of older people and infection prevention and control teams.

“I began with the care of older people department even before I became an MPH volunteer, as I also belonged to the Community Health Council, having been proposed by my Soroptimist International club, and was their representative for health and welfare.

“Because I was showing a particular interest in the elderly, the hospital management team invited me to join the care of older people team. Soon after that volunteering became a thing at MPH…so I became one!

“A short while after becoming a volunteer, I joined the infection prevention and control team, so my experience across the hospital was so varied.

“I’ve always found that as volunteers, our opinions, suggestions and offers of help were always listened to, and our values taken into account when discussions were taking place about our patients’/carers’ experience in the hospital.

“Becoming a volunteer in the NHS is a most rewarding experience. I’ve been a Musgrove Partner for over 30 years and have not regretted one moment!”

Karen Holden, our associate director for clinical transformation, adds:

“On behalf of the many colleagues at MPH that Joyce has supported, challenged, inspired, shared ideas and thoughtful insights with, we give enormous thanks.

“Joyce has had such a positive impact in improving patient care over her 30 plus years in the Musgrove Partner role.

“She has been influential in the improvements to the service for our older, frail patients, and across the trust she supported audits, surveys, hand hygiene training (many of us recall the glow box with Joyce!), infection control, support in oncology, radiology, care of the dying, chaplaincy, and research to name but a few.

“Her skills with plain English shone through, with reading and editing many patient leaflets and letters, including through the COVID-19 pandemic. Joyce was able to help shape strategies and policies, ensuring we kept the patient and family experience at the centre of all we did.

“Colleagues have shared how they enjoyed interviewing with Joyce, in awe at her ‘killer questions’ for the candidates. We are grateful that right up until the summer Joyce was still involved with supporting our peri-operative service developments.

“With a cheerful, determined, intelligent and practical approach, colleagues have enjoyed and appreciated working with Joyce. We have all learnt so much from our time with her and she will be missed!”

With our sincere thanks to Joyce and our very best wishes, we hope you enjoy a well-earned retirement!