Thirty years ago, Li Qi didn't think she would make a good nurse because she believed she was not gentle or patient enough. On August 5, the devoted 61-year-old nurse stepped up to receive the 39th Nightingale Award, the top international prize for a nurse and she is the only nurse in Shanghai ever to win one.

"I am happy to get the prize and I think I may deserve it. But the happiest thing of all for me is to see my patients cured," said Li.

She retired from Shanghai No. 2 People's Hospital two years ago but she still works in the hospital's "Mrs Li Qi" Dressing Room, the only room that has been named after a nurse.

Li is no different from any of Shanghai's crop of elderly women - short, weak, wrinkled face and simple dress. But what resides inside her slight 1.5-metre frame is an amazingly tough spirit.

"She is more like a man than a woman because of her firm will and persevering personality," said Li's husband, Zhang Jinde.

Early life

Born in Zhangjiagang in East China's Jiangsu Province, Li had a lot of hard work to do as a country girl, raising cows, cutting grass and catching fish.

In 1959, when the country girl came to Shanghai, she had no idea about the big city or what her future career would be. She entered the Nursing School at Shanghai Children's Hospital because her mother thought being a nurse and wearing a white dress was not too bad.

After graduation in 1962, she started her lifelong career but she didn't like the job at all at first. "My personality is carefree, not gentle or patient; my voice is loud, not soft enough. I couldn't bear the scene in hospital seeing the patients moaning and the children crying," Li recalled.

But the day she saved the life of a child patient totally changed her attitude and she became fully aware of the importance of nursing. One day when Li was on a tour of inspection of the wards, she found the pupils of the eyes of a child suffering cerebral concussion had dilated.

The pupils did not react to light but he had seemed normal one hour before. Li called doctors immediately and a timely operation saved the child's life.

She also began to make innovations in the treatment of badly infected wounds.

"I couldn't understand why some minor wounds took several months or even years to heal. Some patients even had to have their arms or legs amputated due to the wounds becoming infected so I decided to overcome the problem in my own way," she said.

Pioneering spirit

Despite pressure from doctors (for nurses must be always be obedient to doctors), Li was a nurse of independent spirit. She developed a more effective treatment which was to use oily gauze to keep the wound wet when the traditional theory was to keep the wound dry.

Later, she developed a cheap and useful paste made of traditional Chinese medicines - "Liqigao" - for treating wounds.

Beside making clinical records for various wound treatments, Li also went to libraries for more new knowledge. Based on her rich clinical experience, she began publishing her theories in various professional medical magazines in the 1970s.

Her research results have been recognized by her medical partners and patients come from all over China to obtain treatment for their wounds.

Volunteer work

Li believes treating and caring patients is the responsibility of a nurse and her footsteps have roamed all around the city over the past 20 years.

She gives up most of her spare time - noon breaks, evenings and weekends - providing free home service for patients who can't come to the hospital or who are in financial difficulties.

"They are too poor. I can't stand to see them being tortured by their wounds," said Li.

Li suffers from severe sciatica, and even walking is hard for her in bad weather. But she has never stopped her home service for patients.

During the Spring Festival of 1980, Li walked three hours to treat a patient in Pudong District. It was raining and cold and Li collapsed on the way and the pain in her legs was torture. But she pressed on. "I can't break my promise to my patients because they are waiting for me," she said.

Gu Tao is the patient Li has treated for the longest time. He became paralyzed after a traffic accident and his 10 bedsores would not heal. To help the young man, Li provided home service for him for 22 years until he died.

Whenever Gu called for help, Li would be there and never asked for payment. Each time Li treated his sores, she had to squat beside the bed for more than an hour at a time.

Yao Jian, chairman of Li's hospital's Labour Union, told the Shanghai Star that Li Qi had spent about 15,522 hours on making free home visits and in nursing after her work day had finished. That amounted to another 1,943 working days! The patients she has looked after in her own time total 435 - enough to fill a hospital. Li also established more than 300 family wards.

Although Li has retired from the hospital, she goes to the dressing room twice a week as many patients still ask for her help.

Family life

"I planned to travel with her after retirement but so many patients are waiting for her. She is such a strong-minded woman - how can we stop her work?" said Li's husband.

The couple's jobs have kept them apart most of the time. Li's husband, a senior engineer, had to leave Shanghai for Northwest China's Qinghai Province to help in the border areas 100 days after their wedding.

From 1966 to 2001, he had very few holidays which would allow him to stay with the family. Li, as devoted to work as her husband, didn't have too much time for the family. All the housework and caring the two children were shouldered by Li's mother.

"I can't spend more time for my family because I have so many patients," she said. "There are only a few members in my family and their issues can be treated later while the patients' diseases can't be delayed."

But Li feels she owes much to her family for her career as she has spent so little time caring her children and mother.

Li's daughter, Zhang Qing, had very poor eyesight due to a serious eye disease she contracted in childhood. At first she was thought to be merely near-sighted. "If I could have detected her disease earlier, it wouldn't have developed like it did," said the mother.

(Shanghai Star August 28, 2003)