Page 17 - ALMI 10TH ANNUAL MOTHER'S DAY AWARD CONCERT

BIOGRAPHY OF
Beatrice Jestina Burton
Mrs. Beatrice Jestina Burton was born in the little fishing community of South Caicos, Turks and Caicos Islands, on 1st October 1934, and attended Nine’s Cottage School, South Caicos Primary School, and Grand Turk High School, now the H.J. H.J.Robinson High.
Islands, two [2] bachelor’s degrees, and a nurse practitioner’s certificate. In collaboration with the Pan American
World Organization [PAHO], the United Nations Children’s Fund [UNICEF], and the United Nations Population Fund [UNFPA],
A six-month course in Maternal and
She began her nursing career at the South Caicos Clinic as a dispensary assistant in 1950, and in 1954 attended University College Hospital and Kingston Public Hospital, famously known as KPH, in Kingston, Jamaica, graduating with a Registered General Nurse Certificate in 1958. She worked for two [2] years at the Tuberculosis Unit on Slipe Pen Road in Kingston, taking care of children aged six [6] months to ten [10] years, and returned to the Turks and Caicos
Child Health for registered and clinically trained nurses was held to enable them
to assist the midwife in performing deliveries, and also Community Health Aide and Advanced First Aid courses
were planned to assist in primary
care programs. Granny midwives also benefited from a six [6]-month program to upgrade skills while helping to serve the community.
Nurse Burton attended
Islands, working as a staff nurse at the Grand
numerous courses, workshops, seminars, and conferences
Turk Hospital.
In April 1960, she traveled to the United
Kingdom to study midwifery, graduating as a State Certified
Midwife from St.
nationally, regionally, and internationally on nursing research, service, education, drugs, AIDS research and counseling, and disaster preparedness. She visited areas in
James’s Hospital, Leeds, Yorkshire, and South London Hospital for Women and Children
the Caribbean where
landslides and volcano
eruptions occurred and saw the devastation
in 1961. She worked
that occurred as a
at St. Olave’s Hospital, London, and St. Helier Hospital, Surrey, as a trained nurse-midwife and acting ward sister in charge of wards for a period of five [5] years.
result. She coordinated
the development of the Disaster Preparedness Plan for the Health Services of the Turks
After having been invited to return home to help ease the nursing shortage, she worked as staff nurse in charge of South Caicos Clinic for two and a half years and in Nassau, Bahamas, as nurse-in-charge of the Bahamas Medical Centre for seven
and Caicos Islands, wrote a manual on Disaster Preparedness, and began a Mass Casualty Management Plan. She is a founding member of the Drug Support Group and assisted with establishing a place called “The Green Door” to help in substance abuse rehabilitation. She
was also a member of the National and
years.
the Executive AIDS Committees, Health Practitioner’s Board, and Scholarship Board.
She always felt a strong desire to serve her people in her native land, so she returned home, working as acting matron, matron, senior staff nurse in charge of wards, and chief nursing officer for a period of sixteen [16] years. She earned a Health Services Management Certificate, which is equivalent to an associate degree, from the University of Guyana, completed Open University studies in Barbados, and earned a Community Health Nursing Certificate from the University of the West Indies in St. Lucia, West Indies.
After retiring from the Turks and Caicos Islands Government, she worked at Beaches Turks and Caicos Resort and Spa as a resort nurse for five [5] years and as nurse manager of the Center of Love and Hope, an AIDS hospice in Providenciales, for five [5] years. After the closure of the Center of Love and Hope, Nurse Burton was instrumental in the facility being repurposed as a walk-in clinic to serve the residents of Blue Hills.
Nurse Burton continues to be active in
She founded a pre-nursing program for high school graduates awaiting their nursing course, which a pre-med student also benefited from, and strongly supported two [2] two-year associate degrees in nursing for seven [7] clinically trained nurses from the Turks and Caicos
the nursing profession and has been a member of the Nursing and Midwifery Professions Council since 2019.
Mrs. Burton is the proud mother of five children, three [3] daughters and two [2] sons, but one daughter is deceased.
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