Nurse in Electrical Department, and abbreviation (1921 census)

[arthurk]

Please can anyone explain the occupation in this 1921 census entry and the abbreviation next to it? The person is clearly a Sick Nurse at the Royal Bath Hospital in Harrogate, but why the Electrical Department? And what does the abbreviation I.S.T.M. stand for?

The full entry is at RG15/23448 ED11 sch111 - Nelly Mayall Hirst.

[AlanBoyd]

A department administering some sort of electrotherapy perhaps?

[RJ_Paton]

For quite some time Electricity was considered a cure all for many afflictions and although many practices had stopped by the early 20th Century others were still in the development stage (electro convulsive therapy)

[fiddlerslass]

Perhaps involved in electrotherapy. This was used for example in treating " shell shock" after WW1particularly by Dr Yealand at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in Queen Square, London.

From

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3673538/

"Electrical treatment had its heyday in the 19th century, fuelled by advances in both electromagnetism and neurophysiology (Rowbottom and Susskind, 1984). Departments of electrotherapy were opened in leading teaching hospitals, such as the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford and Guy’s Hospital in London where Golding Bird applied faradic currents for the treatment of hysterical paralysis in the 1840s. The main advocate of electrotherapy in France was Guillaume-Benjamin-Amand Duchenne (1806–75), who applied it for the treatment of disorders of peripheral nerve and muscle. His 1855 work, De l’électrisation localisée, was translated into English in 1871 by Herbert Tibbits (1838–91), the medical superintendent of the West End Hospital for Diseases of the Nervous System in Welbeck Street, London. Electrotherapy was also popular with asylum psychiatrists in the late 19th century, applied not only to the limbs but also to the head, and there were occasional reports of inadvertent seizures, in effect precursors of electroconvulsive treatment. "

There was also electric light therapy

https://museumandarchives.redcross.org.uk/objects/6426

ISTM possibly a member of the Incorporated Society of Trained Masseuses

https://cdm16198.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16198coll1/id/155/

[RJ_Paton]

The 844 annotation refers to the job classification and according to the list it falls under these categories.

844. Sick Nurses.

    Ambulance Nurse.
    Aspirant (a Nursing Sister).
    Charge Nurse.
    Home Sister.
    Hospital Nurse.
    Iniirmary Nurse, Probationer.
    Male Nurse.
    Maternity Nurse.
    Monthly Nurse.
    Night Nurse.
    Nurse (not Domestic).
    Nurse Attendant.
    Nursing Home Manager, Manageress, Proprietor, Proprietress.
    Nursing Sister.
    Obstetric Nurse.
    Probationer (not in Lunatic Asylum).
    Probationer Nurse.
    Sister (Hospital, Infirmary, &c.).
    Staff Nurse.
    Superintendent Nurse.
    Tender Nurse.
    Trained Nurse.
    Ward Sister.
    Matron of Asylum, Epileptic Colony, Fever Hospital, Hospital, Infirmary, Isolation Hospital, Lunatic Asylum, Mental Deficiency Home, Nursing Home, Sanatorium, Workhouse Infirmary or other Institution for the care of the Sick or Mentally Afflicted.

[Jo6100]

https://www.csp.org.uk/frontline/article/foreign-fields-physiotherapys-links-first-world-war

Possibly this: incorporated society of trained masseuses, precursor to physiotherapist

[arthurk]

Thank you very much, everyone - between you all I think you've cracked it.

Putting it all together, she was most likely what we'd call a physiotherapist who was also administering electrotherapy - I note fiddlerslass's quote in reply #3 about it being used in "the treatment of disorders of peripheral nerve and muscle" - and/or electric light treatment.

Thanks again.