Rowena Hansen has been a nurse for almost 15 years. She started in the aged care industry and as an enrolled nurse, upgraded her nursing degree to a bachelor’s degree and worked in the hospital for a few years. She did her master’s certificate in intensive care but ended up going back to her passion which is aged care.
Landing in the nursing career was not really her plan until she started volunteering around her community.
“I actually didn’t think much of it. But, when I came to Australia at 17, I didn’t know anyone so I started volunteering around the community," she says.
"I went to some nursing homes and volunteered my time just to get to know the place and get to know more people around me then I fell in love with nursing at that time so I decided to pursue it as a career.”
Currently, Ms Hansen is a clinical specialist manager at an aged care facility. She does handovers, and is in charge of the 92-bed facility and has three support registered nurses under her, staff members including PCA and kitchen staff that she oversees. Most importantly, she looks after the needs of the residents.
“I go around and check who is sick or who needs urgent attention. Kind of like triaging on who would need immediate care, whose family needs attention. I look at their care plan if it’s up to date and check medications for the residents if it is still needed and within reasonable dosing.”
Travails of a Filipino nurse
Raised to be compassionate, Ms Hansen says she struggled in the first five years of the profession, but through the years, she learned how to manage her emotions especially when a patient dies.
“The first five years of being a nurse I was emotional but as the years go by you actually learn how to have barriers and not to be too affected especially when they [patient] pass away. I guess being a nurse when you care so much and worry about your patient, sometimes you take it home with you. That’s actually one thing that most nurses have tried to deal with, try not to take all the worry back home. I think if the situation doesn’t affect you anymore that is when you have to question if it’s the right career for you."
Ms Hansen adds there were incidents in the past when nurses were verbally abused by family members who weren't able to cope with the condition of their loved one. The training in place helped her deal with the situation.
For nurse Rowena Hansen wearing a colourful headdress and scarf is one way of cheering up residents of the facility. Source: Rowena Hansen
"You get visitors who would talk down to you but it all goes down to giving them the facts and really assessing the situation," she says.
"If you see that the other person is not willing to communicate in a peaceful manner that's when you have to put a pause or a stop from the conversation and maybe go back to it at a later time when they’re a little bit collected."
She says providing care gave her a sense of purpose.
“It feels really good if you provide your care to everyone and if you provide a service that everyone appreciates. It’s just that moment of looking after someone at their most vulnerable time, I just find that very rewarding," she says.
"If you know the term 'caritas love' [charity love], then your love towards your patient will really flourish. If you know how it feels to give, you know how rewarding it is.”
Going beyond the nursing role
Filipino nurses have always been known for their innate caring nature, and because of that, they are sought-after globally.
“I’m happy to say that most of the Filipino nurses I met will look after them [patients] like they are our own family member.
"We have the warmth, we treat our residents or patients as a family, we don’t treat them as a member. We actually go beyond the role. The words ‘nothing is too much’ actually reflects what a Filipino nurse is.”
She cites an example when she and a couple of Filipino nurses volunteered to buy presents for a particular resident who had not been visited by his family.
“This resident had no family member visiting and no one is buying him anything. A few of us, Filipino nurses purchased a few things for that resident because we treated that resident like our own family.”
The bubbly Miss Hansen also wears colourful costumes and headdress on special occasions to entertain the residents of the facility.
She believes that in a facility, residents must be involved in fun and engaging activities in order to maintain a positive atmosphere.
"In an aged care facility, we also make sure that their everyday life is full of colour because sometimes when you are in a facility you are stuck on the same general activities. We had a resident who was turning 90 years old, we organised a surprise birthday party for that resident without asking the facility to do it."
Rowena Hansen loves to wear colourful costumes and headdress to entertain her patients at the facility where she works. Source: Rowena Hansen
Encouraging other nurses
Ms Hansen also emphasises the importance of encouraging fellow colleagues who are struggling in the workplace.
“I encourage them to dig deeper and not to take everything personally. They have to distinguish why the behaviour is happening and most of the time, it’s because of guilt as most of them are unable to look after their loved one and sometimes they have expectations that cannot be realistically met at a certain time."
Nursing is not just a job
For Ms Hansen, nursing is more than just a profession, it is something that she is truly passionate about.
“You really have to love it otherwise you’re not gonna last as a nurse. I have seen that with other people who did nursing for the sake of being called an RN. Nursing is also customer service, you deal with families and you also deal with the complex personalities of your patients."
