Nurse takes her skills to Africa

Rose Baah, 60, of Dorchester Close, Blackburn, returns to her native Ghana for three months in January to work long hours in poverty-stricken conditions in an Accra hospital.

She has also spent a chunk of her retirement fund on three crates of clothes and equipment to take back with her.

Rose retired after spending all her working life in England at Queen's Park Hospital and Blackburn Royal Infirmary since emigrating from Accra in 1966.

Colleagues paid tribute to Rose at a leaving party for the way she overcame language and cultural barriers to prosper as a staff nurse.

"When I came over I really wanted to learn. We got six weeks of training and they would put you on the ward to learn on your feet," said Rose.

"Today nurses are force fed and do many courses until they are on the ward.

"People worked hard in the early days, we had to or we wouldn't get paid.

"I like caring for people and making them better. Thirty-five years in one hospital in Blackburn -- that's all I've done.

"The language was difficult at first but I took to the job straight away. I had a bit of background in it as a cadet in Ghana.

"I could not just sit there and do nothing, and it's quite tough in Ghana. "

Sister Sheila Leech, who worked with Rose on ward B1 at Queen's Park Hospital, said: "She has used part of her retirement fund to buy clothes and equipment to take back to Ghana.

"She is an excellent nurse and a very kind person. She would go out of her way to help patients with little things -- like if somebody had nothing she would bring them a present in.

"She is a quiet person and deeply religious, but she wouldn't ram it down your throats but she carried out her religion through her actions.

"At her leaving party she thanked everybody else for allowing her to work in Blackburn at the hospitals -- normally it is the other way around."

Rose said she wants to thank all the staff on wards B1, B4, B6 and B8 for her leaving party and presents.