Monyake driven by saving lives
Nurse would not let strike, poor health derail plans
Professional nurse Pontsho Monyake may have taken a long time to get to her dream job, but her passion remains unrequited.
“I actually started studying with a six-month course as a care worker just after matric,” Monyake said.
In 2008 she enrolled for a nursing course with Netcare.
“While on this course, by God’s grace I was admitted at Baragwanath [Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital], for their nursing course. After I had been applying since after matric. I started at Bara in 2011,” Monyake said.
The qualification included psychiatry, midwifery, community and general nursing, and can be identified by the maroon epaulettes worn on the shoulder.
“At private institutions you become a staff nurse and most people go [and] work then come back to enrol for further studies. A lot of people take this option because fees are expensive. In 2008 the fees were [around] R21 000,” said Monyake.
She graduated from Chris Hani Baragwanath Nursing College in March last year.
Monyake said her studies were prolonged because there was a strike in 2012 and she also had to take leave for medical reasons.
She now works in the theatre at Helen Joseph Hospital in Johannesburg as an ICU nurse. “When you start your training as a nurse you rotate, and where you rotate last is where you will be placed permanently. That is how I ended up in theatre. I am starting to enjoy theatre, but I [did] love the medical ward.
“This is where you get very sick people – [cases of] extreme high blood pressure, diabetes and cancer. I love that feeling when a patient comes in helpless and [is later discharged healthier]. I fell in love with this [feeling of nursing people back to health] when I was a care worker at the oldage homes where we went for practicals,” said Monyake.
“In theatre, I am also a floor nurse. This means that I sometimes take over the duties the nurses in theatres do. I also do scrubbing. As a scrub nurse one ensures sterility in theatre. This includes a certain technique of washing of hands and the gear we wear. The theatre gowns are washed in autoclave machines, it cooks the germs to ensure they are killed.”
The nurse said her first traumatic experience was in 2012 after they had to operate on a car crash victim. Both of his lower limbs were fractured and his spleen was damaged, but the patient survived.
Monyake said she was an introvert who loved staying indoors, but she enjoyed forex trading and works part-time at the Forever Living Health Network. “I do not want to see myself as an old grumpy nurse, I want to make a bit of money. The reason nurses are grumpy is because management and the community are always fighting with them, and yet they try so hard without anyone saying thank you.”