The new Spinal Injuries Ireland (SII) Resource Centre is officially called the Aileen McCarthy Resource Centre because she is the linchpin on which the organisation was founded in 1992.
Sr. Aileen McCarthy
Sr. Aileen also played a pivotal role in the founding of the National Rehabilitation Hospital in 1961. Without Aileen’s passion and dedication over the last six decades, the lives of people with spinal cord injuries might have played out very differently in Ireland.
Sr. Aileen was born in Cork in 1928 to a family of four siblings – three brothers and one sister. Aileen was a keen sportswoman from an early age and when she was in her teenage years she was a competitive swimmer and she won medals at swimming galas. She also enjoyed playing hockey, tennis, badminton and was a keen poker player for many years. Sr. Aileen’s real love of sport came into play, however when she began playing golf. She excelled at golf and was picked to play at a very high level.
“I was a scratch golfer and I represented Ireland on the Irish International Women’s Team before I entered Mercy” explained Sr. Aileen. Her passion for golfing continued well into her later years even though nuns were not technically supposed to play golf!”
Her proud nephew Paul McCarthy explained: “It was unheard of for a nun to compete in golf events so Aileen got around this by playing under the pseudonym Aileen Driver!”
In 1952, Sr. Aileen entered the Sisters of Mercy where she studied for four years to become a nun.
“I had very religious parents. I got my faith from them. I was given the name Sr. Marie of the Cross so many people still know me as Sr. Marie”.
After Sr. Aileen took her vows to become a nun, she began training to become a Nurse and as part of her training she worked in the Mater Hospital in Dublin 7 and St. Michael’s Hospital, Dun Laoghaire.
In 1960 Sr. Aileen travelled to England with Sr. Bernadette, (who subsequently became the Matron at the NRH) and two nurses Brid Murphy and Anne Kilcoyne. The group worked together at Stoke Mandeville Rehabilitation Hospital and a number of other training centres in England. They worked in the UK for over a year and took part in rehabilitation nurse training.
“We did a six month training course over in Stoke Mandeville. Stoke Mandeville Hospital was the pioneer rehabilitation unit for spinal injuries in England – if not in all of Europe. The spinal injuries unit was run by Dr. Ludwig Guttman who had just escaped from Nazi Germany”.
“A lot of patients who had escaped World War 2 with spinal injuries came to England and that’s where we learned about the rehabilitation of spinal injuries. We learned a lot over there. When Sr. Aileen returned to Ireland she began working with Dr. Thomas Gregg from the Mater Hospital who had the idea of opening a rehabilitation hospital for patients with spinal cord injury”.
At that time the NRH was called Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital and it was primarily used to treat patients who had Tuberculosis (TB). Sr. Aileen explained: “The hospital cared for TB patients then, but the disease was almost eradicated and they began winding down the hospital building but Dr. Gregg had a great idea to turn it into a rehabilitation hospital. So, after we came back from training in England, we started getting the hospital ready for Dr. Gregg”.
Dr. Gregg was appointed as the first Medical Director of the NRH and he became a pioneer in the treatment of patients with spinal cord injury in Ireland.
Patients began to be transferred from the Mater Hospital to the new rehabilitation facility and it eventually went on to be named The National Rehabilitation Hospital in 1994.
“That started the hospital on its path until it grew to the size it is now. I was there from the very beginning, along with Dr. Gregg and Sr. Bernadette, Brid Murphy, Anne Kilcoyne, Dr. Paddy Carew and a few others”.
Sr. Aileen played a key role in running the wards of the NRH from the very beginning. In 1961 she commenced her first Ward Manager position in the NRH Spinal Unit which was then called St. Joseph’s Ward. This was the first ever rehabilitation unit in Ireland.
“The role of the rehabilitation nurses evolved over the years. The nurses play an integral part of the multidisciplinary team now, but it was a little bit different in my day”. Some years later following an agreement, a Board of Management was established at the NRH, and Sr. Aileen was appointed to the Board where she remained in her role until she retired in 2012.
Over the years Sr. Aileen became increasingly interested in what happened to patients once they were discharged from hospital. This led to her establishing the Spinal Injury Liaison Service which was in essence, an early form of Spinal Injuries Ireland.
The Spinal Injury Liaison Service allowed Sr. Aileen to leave the hospital and visit patients throughout Ireland to review their progress post – discharge from the NRH.
“In those days Sr. Aileen regularly risked life and limb travelling around the country on her Honda 50 motorbike to visit these patients”.
Eva Wallace, a retired Urology Nurse at the NRH explained: “Over the years Sr. Aileen always put patients first which included supporting accessible holidays and taking patients home and staying with them for a couple of days until the family was trained in the necessary skills. This helped to promote independence and prevent complications ensuring an enhanced quality of life both for patient and family members”.
When necessary, Sr. Aileen would fund raise to achieve her aim. She fundraised to purchase a wheelchair accessible van to take patients out on trips and visit their homes. Most notably she also fulfilled one patient’s dream of arranging a trip to Cork by helicopter to allow him to visit his friends. There he was treated like a king for the day. The patient had a high level spinal injury with complex care needs and he was a C4 quadriplegic. He lived on that day for the rest of his life.
Day of the launch of the newly named Resource Centre, 26th March 2018
Sr. Aileen explained: “I enjoyed doing things like that, especially that day in Cork. That particular patient had been with us in the hospital for thirteen years as there was no place for him to be discharged to. That was in the earlier years of the NRH, we weren’t as efficient as they are now”. In 1992 Sr. Aileen played a pivotal role in establishing Spinal Injuries Ireland with a number of former NRH patients who had spinal cord injuries.
“Spinal Injuries Ireland started with Colm Whooley, Joan Carty, Christine Bradshaw, Eugene Cahill and a few others and myself. They all had previously stayed in the NRH together and the organisation was based on the grounds of the NRH campus. They were founded 25 years ago this year, a lot has changed since then. Over the last few years Fiona took over as CEO and she has done an amazing job along with my nephew James McCarthy who is on the Board of Spinal Injuries Ireland. My other nephew Tiernan McCarthy, who is an architect, recently designed the entire fit out of the new resource centre too which was brilliant”.
“The organisation has continued the work I started by carrying on nationwide visits to patients in their homes through their Community Outreach Team. The organisation has come a long way and I am very proud of the work they carry out. It is very important that the organisation continues to grow and I am looking forward to seeing it develop further over the coming years”.
(From an article written by Spinal Injuries Ireland)
Clare Gunning rsm
South Central Province
