HAVING spent a lot of her childhood living in nursing homes, there was a degree of inevitability about Paula Viergrever’s career path.

For the past two decades, Paula has been the heartbeat of care at Gippsland Southern Health Service as a nurse at Koorooman and Alchera House, while also providing community-based nursing services. 

While she has also worked in district nursing and alcohol and other drug care, Paula describes aged care nursing as her “calling”.

And it’s all thanks to her mother Sue, whose own nursing career covered three decades with GSHS after introducing Paula to the world of aged care.

They emigrated from England when Paula was three and she soon got to experience the inner workings of aged care before the family moved to Leongatha when she was 15.

“Mum was a nursing manager at an aged care facility in Sandringham,” Paula recalls. 

“Our unit was at the back and my bedroom had a door into the nursing home. We lived there for about two years from when I was eight to 10.

She recalls another nursing home where her mother worked night shifts.

“I can remember sliding down the big staircase railing. It wasn’t like the nursing homes we have now. It was a very big old house with two or three residents to a bedroom and three storeys high.

“I was scared of sleeping in my room by myself because it was right at the top, almost like an attic.”

Wherever she stayed, Paula loved the experience of interacting with the residents.

“We moved from England when I was three so my grandparents weren’t here, but I had plenty of others and was never short of someone to read with,” she said.

“I’d often walk around and see all the residents. I could read my reader to any of them. There were a couple in particular that I kept in contact with and would see after we left.”

Sue also did night shifts in aged care nursing work and Paula would join her.

“It’s pretty ironic when you think about it and look back and think `gee, I used to live in a nursing home and now I’m still around one’,” she said.

Paula didn’t immediately move into aged care work.

“I had children young and then worked cleaning houses for the shire before doing my personal care certificate and starting care in the home.”

But nursing “ran through the family” and Paula’s two sisters had become registered nurses.

She started her nursing career at age 33, following in the footsteps of her younger sisters.

The reasoning was simple “I’ve always loved caring for people.”

“I love the work environment, and I love working with the residents.”

Now 57 and celebrating 20 years with GSHS, Paula has no plans to retire just yet.

“I couldn’t see myself doing anything else,” she said. “It’s all I know, and I enjoy it.”

And when she does eventually retire, Paula will more than likely keep visiting residents, just as she does these days with her little dog Charli, who has become a favourite at Alchera.

Paula says aged care has changed dramatically for the better from the days she was sliding down the railings in Sandringham.

“It’s much better now,” she said. 

“I don’t know how the backs of the older nurses held out when they were lifting people without the supports that we have today. All the supports have made it a lot easier physically and now we have a lot of tools, guidelines and training for dealing with people.”