Doctor Bathoon

A Memory of Shotley Bridge.

My memory is of Shotley bridge hospital in May 1960 I was four years old and had been born with a hole in the heart. I was token by ambulance to shotley bridge to have my heart surgery.

There was no children ward in the hospital, so I was put on the women's ward.


There was a young girl on the ward she was 16 called Dorothy she had heart problems to, hers was inoperable. During my three weeks stay my older sister and Dorothy knit clothes for the baby doll that I had been given for coming into hospital, which I called after her. Her mother and mine kept intouch although we never saw them again. The communication ended after her death at 17.

My memory is of a art deco building with a partly gardened grounds, as I remember the Doctors office was on the ground floor. One of the Windows French window made of metal and glass in square panels. Positioned opposite the office door. Looked out on to a garden.

I remember the side ward that I was in for a number of days. On the morning of my operation I was put in the bath, then painted with iodine, my skin was like a mottled orange and yellow around my chest area, were they would operate.

After I came back from theatre, as part of post op care I had to have a number of injection, and the nurse who was looking after me gave me a needle to give my doll an injection in her bottom too. I was moved onto the main ward while I still had the drain tube in my side the tube being attached to a clear glass bottle.

On the day that my stiches came out I can't remember how many, my mother knew but I can't recall now, I was taken into a side room by the sister and she removed them. I can call this memory to mind.

I remember my Doctor was a lady doctor Bathoon, I am not sure of the spelling.
I believe she preformed my operation. I do know that this was the only hospital that was doing open heart surgery then.

In the early sixties it was unheard of for mothers to stay in hospital with their children. Even much younger children then I was at four going on five, and indeed babies that were in after they had been in born were removed from their Mother's and put into hospital were they could get the medical treatment required. This was how it was.

Due to the fact that I was the youngest of four children. Someone needed to be at home for my. Brother then 12, and two sisters 10, and 9,


My father who had had a bad accident down the pit 9 years before, lucky to be alive, but sadly not lucky enough to be given a job out of the pit by the NCB who employed him, had to return to work down the pit before they would consider him for transfer on bank, despite the Orthopaedic Specialist saying dad was not to go back down the pit, it was to be another 3/4 years before this happened. Dad had a family to feed so returned to work. The family doctor was only to happy to give him a sick note to cover him, giving him a well earned time away from the pit. This freed up Mam to travel every day getting two buses to and from hospital every day for the whole three weeks I was in. Traveling from Ashington in Northumberland to Consett in Durham. They must have been in extreme hardship. Only Dads sick pay, Feeding the family and the cost of bus fares.

Sadly some of the hardships could have been spared, as dad had relatives in the area, as his mother came from the area and her brother and his family lived down the road my Grandmother had written to them and asked him I they could put them up for three weeks, sadly they turned her down.

Family should pull together in a crisis, but this does not always happen.

These are my memory of Shotley bridge hospital and three weeks of my life and the circumstances surrounding my family at what must have been a worrying time for my parents, the strain that it must have put on them, can only be appreciated by other that have been in simular circumstances.


Stephanie Parry,

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