Hospital matron
Born: February 18, 1924;
Died: January 10, 2017
LOUISE Burgener, who has died aged 92 was a classic example of an immigrant who made a big impact in Scotland.
She was born in Zurich, but her parents' relationship collapsed and she was placed in foster care. Then, on leaving care, she began to care for others, initially in Switzerland, before, in the early 1950s, she came to Scotland, and to Ailsa Hospital, just outside Ayr.
As well as training to become a registered mental nurse at this old-style asylum, she was learning English, eventually, in 1955, gaining her registration. This was not the summit of her ambition, however, as she immediately set out to obtain her RGN qualification as a general nurse.
She opted to remain at the Ailsa, however, and her professionalism and care for her patients soon saw her earning promotion. She became a nurse tutor, and eventually rose to become assistant matron at the hospital.
Although never afraid of the responsibilities of management, she always insisted her happiest years were those on the wards, and the daily routine of patient care. In later years, with the change to a more community-based approach to mental health nursing, she played her part in establishing new protocols. For Louise Burgener, the patient always came first.
Ill-health forced her into early retirement. She now had the time to travel, including one road trip back to see her extended family in Zurich. This involved driving herself there in her trusted Lada. She did not bother with hotels, preferring to sleep in the car at night.
In retirement, she house-sat for a friend for a number of years, which encouraged her to become involved in gardening. Her final years, however, were spent in her own flat in Troon, prior to her final illness and move to the Ayrshire Hospice.
Her father had been a musician, and music, in particular the classics, was always a huge part of her life. She had a large and comprehensive collection of classic albums and CDs, while her radio dial was set to Classic FM – she found BBC Radio 3 “too stuffy”.
Another of her interests was photography and she was seldom without either her cine or still camera on her frequent trips both at home and abroad. She was a very good photographer.
She was a hard worker for the charities she supported, both financially and in deed, while if she had a vice it was that she was a shopaholic. She came to love her adopted Scotland, giving the mentally ill of Ayrshire over 40 years of devoted service, in a life well lived.
She never married, unless you count to the calling of mental health nursing.
MATT VALLANCE
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here