THE woman who helped pioneer the use of Parkinson’s nurses nationally has retired after 22 years of working in Herefordshire.

Caroline Evans cared for around 2,000 patients living with Parkinson’s since becoming Herefordshire’s first Parkinson’s nurse in 1998.

Her successor, Nicola Stapleton, is in post with a new assistant to look after 650 people in the county with the disease.

But outside Herefordshire the transition is not always so smooth, and Mrs Evans is calling for a national strategy to ensure there are no gaps in provision in other parts of the UK.

Mrs Evans, 64, trained at Guys Hospital in London and had been in nursing for 45 years.

When asked about her nursing career, Mrs Evans said: “I have not had one moment of being bored in my nursing career.

“When I see new nurses starting their careers it is clear that the training has changed but the basic need to care for people is still there.

“Throughout my time nursing, I always hoped for a cure for Parkinson’s but sadly that still hasn’t come.

“A patient said to me some time ago, ‘Caroline, you give people not just fortitude but hope’. That will always stay with me.”

Caroline’s move to Herefordshire 22 years ago came after the local Parkinson’s group had campaigned for the NHS to create a post of Parkinson’s Nurse.

The NHS had begun employing Parkinson’s Nurses just eight years earlier and there were only 80 nurses throughout the UK.

Things have improved since then, and now 94.4 percent of Parkinson’s patients have access to a Parkinson’s Nurse, according to last year’s audit.