As part of our series marking 70 years of the NHS, we hear from seven workers who were employed during each of the decades that the service has been running.

June Simms began her nursing training at her local hospital in Rugby in 1950. She studied midwifery in London and then went on to work in pioneering plastic surgery in Oxford.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest June Simms, 86, nurse and theatre sister. June joined the NHS in 1950

June Simms, 86, nurse and theatre sister. “When I was 16 in 1948, I had an operation on my two feet. Unlike today, I was in hospital for three weeks. I decided then, that I quite liked nursing and I’d like to do it.

“I started training in January 1950. I remember going on the male medical ward and it was very scary. I’d been to an all-girls school and it felt a little strange. All the ward sisters seemed quite scary too. First, you got inducted into bedmaking and bed pans. Gradually, we were taught to take urine samples and test them with a bunsen burner, which they don’t do now. I ended up on the medical ward, which was then the Victorian type wards – 30 beds on one side for men, 30 beds on the other side for women … there was a lot of running about.

Life as an NHS nurse in the 1940s: ‘You have to forget about yourself’ Read more

“In 1954 I did my first part midwifery. I didn’t want to be a midwife, I just thought it was something you should know. We used to go out on bicycles with a bag on the back. You’d have to get up in the night if something happened … I remember one night it was snowing. Mothers could stay in hospital much longer then, they could get some rest.

“My friend and I decided to go to the Churchill hospital in Oxford to do a course in plastic surgery. They did treatments for burns and sometimes breast reductions on young girls who were embarrassed and overburdened. We looked after babies with cleft lips; they did the lip first at three months, you had to feed them with a bottle and be very careful as they still had a cleft palate. They got so good at doing cleft lip repairs then.

“It’s different now. Then you got to know the patients very well, the nursing treatment was ongoing and they could be in hospital two or three weeks. Now they like to get them up and about. People were very pleased with the NHS because it was free. They thought it was absolutely marvellous.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Retired psychiatrist, Professor Sir David Goldberg, 84, was working in London in the 1960s

Retired psychiatrist, Prof Sir David Goldberg, 84, was working in London in the 1960s. He describes a relatively comfortable time as a junior doctor and how “horribly different” the world is now.

“I was a medical student at Oxford and did my clinical work at St Thomas’ hospital in London from 1957, qualifying in 1959. Medicine was much more free and easy then. I was told that as a student if I wanted to play golf (I didn’t) or visit art galleries (which I did) then this would be a good time to do it.

“At times I was working more than 100 hours a week but we were treated very well. There was a waiter to serve dinner and you felt you were special. Nowadays, junior doctors are treated extremely badly and don’t have the accommodation perks I had. No one seems to give a damn where they sleep and eat.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Professor Sir David Goldberg, 84, at home

“The 1959 Mental Health Act modernised the situation. However, it was still considered a dangerous innovation to have a psychiatric nurse visiting people’s homes in the 60s. I could remember guys being admitted to me when I was a casualty officer. They would come to me in a straitjacket and I’d say: ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ and they would say yes, and I’d say: ‘Let’s take this off then – as long as you don’t dot [hit]’ me.’ It has changed a lot now; community care has transformed things.

“My best memory from my career is teaching people. When I got my knighthood the Queen asked me why she was giving it to me and I said it was because I’ve taught a generation of doctors how to talk to people. ”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Margarita Meepegama, 74, oncology nurse

Former oncology nurse, Margarita Meepegama, 74, from Jamindan, Philippines trained in London in the 1970s. She describes what it was like during the time when CT scanners were introduced, revolutionising the way tumours could be assessed in the body.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Margarita Meepegama

“My parents died when I was young, leaving me and my 10 siblings to look after each other. I was sent to school and qualified as a midwife but I wanted to go abroad to work. I came to London in 1970 and worked as a healthcare assistant before retraining as a nurse at Hammersmith hospital.

“I had a room with one bed, a sink and a small cupboard. You would never call matron by her name and if you were wearing your cape when she came you had to take it off. We were given a small amount of money for our expenses and I remember my first salary was £30 a month. It was shillings and pence then – for one shilling you could buy a lot like bread and butter.

“There were a few people of colour when I did my training and there was discrimination but it was implicit. I tried to see it in a positive way and never retaliated. Even though some people don’t want to admit it, you can still see it exists today.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Margarita Meepegama, oncology nurse, front row, third right, in 1972 at the start of her training at Hammersmith hospital

“I became a state-enrolled nurse in 1974 and started working at the Royal Marsden the year after, becoming a registered oncology nurse in 1983. I liked working in palliative care and looking after those who needed caring for the most. My best memory is how nice the patients were to me. When they knew we were busy they sometimes even tried to help. Even though I was a foreign nurse they were very understanding.

“I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2006 and ended up being treated by the people I worked with. It was very difficult being a patient as I was used to doing the caring not being the one cared for. When the consultant said I was going to have chemotherapy I was really scared and cried. I said to him I didn’t want it because I knew from when I was working that it was given to people with aggressive forms of cancer and I didn’t want to die. Thankfully, I have been in remission ever since. I am very thankful to the NHS staff who looked after me and for the work life the service has given me over the years. I am very proud to have been a part of it.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Peter Sykes, 75, surgeon

One of the biggest medical advancements during the 80s was the introduction of keyhole surgery. Peter Sykes, 75, a surgeon, explains the impact it had on patients’ lives.

“When keyhole surgery was introduced in the 1980s I was working as an abdominal surgeon. There was no typical day but I spent a lot of time removing gallbladders, colonic tumours. I also did a lot of smaller procedures like piles and hernias.

“Each individual surgeon had a decision to make. Were they going to learn this new technique or continue with the old one until they retired? If you were in your late 30s or 40s then you could see that this was the way surgery was going and you were going to be out of kilter if you didn’t join the revolution.

“It was both challenging and exciting. It had a massive impact on patient care: an operation that kept you in hospital for a week changed and patients were discharged the same or following day. With a keyhole operation, you have four little cuts in your abdomen, none of them wider than the width of your thumb. You were able to go back to a desk job within two weeks and a physical job within three weeks. If someone had cut a 5 inch (12.7 cm) hole in your belly, you spent two months off work.

“It was a difficult skill to learn; every time the surgeon made a move, the instrument they were holding went the opposite way. It was like working in a mirror – everything was reversed. You thought: ‘I can’t do this, I can’t get my head round it.’ Then suddenly, something inside your brain clicks.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest David Amos, 55, hospital general manager. Amos started on an NHS management trainee scheme in 1987

David Amos, 55, a hospital general manager, started on an NHS management trainee scheme in 1987. He talks about his career in during the 1990s, when the health service was struggling financially and facing a recruitment crisis.

“During the 90s the NHS was horrendously cash-strapped. Things were so tight that even St Thomas’ was struggling financially. It now feels similar. Every trust is trying to find every penny they can to keep the show on the road. This is how it was in the 90s. We were constantly taking out jobs and reorganising services.

“Staff morale was declining throughout the decade. When I was at St Mary’s, in nursing we had 30-35% agency staff. There was a staffing crisis and it was a desperate situation. There weren’t enough people being trained, pay wasn’t keeping up and the NHS wasn’t getting significant growth. We couldn’t afford to increase staffing even where it was needed. It meant the NHS wasn’t doing its job properly. I felt helpless – we had a service to run and we couldn’t recruit and retain the people we needed.

Life as an NHS nurse in the 1970s: ‘There was a prejudice that nurses shouldn’t be educated’ Read more

“At St Thomas’ people were on waiting lists for three or four years for conditions such as hernia repair and general surgery, and at least 18 months for cardiac problems. In some cases, we didn’t even keep waiting lists because they were so long. People were waiting at every entry point. That all got uncovered before 1997, when the pre-Blair government started focusing on bringing waiting lists down. The 90s was a consequence of under-investment in the 80s.

“If I told someone outside my work that I was a hospital manager, I was considered the devil. There’s still a sense that you only need doctors, nurse, midwives and physios to run a hospital and any management is pure overhead. With 1.5 million employees at the time and organisations with up to 20,000 staff, the NHS needed management, organisation and administration.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Rachel Henaghan, 47, ambulance technician who became a paramedic

Rachel Henaghan, 47, qualified as a paramedic in 2009 but worked as an ambulance technician before that.

“When I started working in the ambulance service it was seen as a job for life. In the early 2000s you’d turn up on station, meet the crew who had finished the night shift, make a cup of tea, check your vehicle and have a chat with other people on shift. Now we cover much greater distances, we don’t have downtime, we have outstanding job numbers and it’s a much busier operation.



“Because we were going in and out of hospitals, we didn’t feel financial pressures until our job numbers started to increase and we were struggling to meet demand. It’s been a gradual process since 2005. I don’t think it’s sustainable now to work at this pace without a career plan to go and do something else.

“During those years, there was more familiarity and camaraderie because we had time. My best memories were when we’d pull out all the stops to work with other agencies. I get to see people do remarkable things and work together under challenging circumstances.

70 years of the NHS: a revolution that is reborn every day Read more

“My worst experience from that decade has stayed with me. I was 33 and four years into my NHS service. I remember going out to an elderly couple in their 90s on Christmas Eve. They’d been married 60 years. I had to take the husband to hospital but his wife wasn’t able to go with them. They had no family and this was the first night they’d been apart. Their house was immaculately presented and there was this photo of two children on a swing. I remember saying how beautiful it was and asking if it was of their children. The lady immediately replied: ‘Yes, they both died and we didn’t have any more children.’ It was really difficult to hear and have to take her husband to hospital, and leave her there at Christmas. I remember saying we should go and see her but you weren’t allowed. This was before the time we had safeguarding; those things have changed now.

“I think the NHS meant the same then as it does now. That lady and her husband would have remembered not having an NHS. They were so grateful and appreciative and understood the value of it. I hope, when I’m elderly, I won’t be looking back to a golden era when we had this wonderful NHS.





Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ayithri Sahadevan, 42, a GP partner in Farnborough

Ayithri Sahadevan, 42, is a GP partner in Farnborough. She tells us about the pressures of working in the last decade and how embracing technology has helped deal with demand.



“I’ve been a GP for the last 15 years. I like the variety of people and problems GPs deal with as well as the continuity of care they provide. Seeing people through the years and building a relationship with them is quite rewarding, and it’s nice to say I’ve known some of my patients since they were babies.

“GPs have been under pressure because of an increased workload (both patient demand and expectation among other things) and reduced resources. However, it’s affecting those in health and social care in general. The workforce is stretched and there are fewer GPs wanting to be partners because a lot of our time is spent doing non-clinical work, administrative and managerial tasks. I spend more time looking at a computer than I do looking at my patients, which is not what you would expect from the role.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ayithri Sahadevan, 42, a GP partner in Farnborough at her surgery

“General practice has made some significant changes in the last decade to survive in the 21st century. We offer online services and e-consultations, and our workforce includes paramedics, pharmacists and nurse practitioners who are able to see patients. The hope is these changes will help sustain us but still maintain our core principles.

“One of the best moments of my career follows what could be considered one of the worst. My surgery faced a threat of closure, which culminated in an ‘inadequate’ rating from the Care Quality Commission. Though they were difficult times, the hard work of staff and the support from patients turned this around and eventually achieved us a ‘good’ rating.

“The NHS as an institution is a reliable provider of free healthcare. However, the majority of people who work for it do more than just their job, making it difficult to quantify exactly how much it means to people. That said, despite the pressures, I still enjoy being a GP.