OBITUARY
Ray Rowden A MAVERICK WHO CHALLENGED THE ESTABLISHMENT AND STOOD UP FOR HIS PATIENTS, WRITES JANET SNELL Nursing has lost one of its most flamboyant and colourful characters with the death of inspirational mental health nurse Ray Rowden at the age of just 62. Ray spent his life challenging the establishment, including at times the RCN leadership, so it was somewhat ironic that he was awarded that most establishment of accolades, an RCN fellowship, in 2013 in recognition of his major contribution to the profession. Born in 1952 in Whitstable, Kent, in modest circumstances, he attended the local secondary modern, emerging with no qualifications. He went to work as a nursing auxiliary at St Augustine’s Hospital in Kent and started his registered mental nurse training there in 1970. He began making waves as a nursing student activist and became one of the first nurse whistleblowers when he spoke out about poor standards of care at the hospital.
But it is for his work in mental health that he will be best remembered. Always ambitious for his patients, while working in south London he pioneered treatment strategies and a more enlightened approach to dealing with black mental health patients – ideas that were novel at the time but are taken for granted now. He knew what it meant to make patients feel human, for example he replaced
familiar figure in a pink shirt with his feet on the desk at meetings. He was political in a way other senior nurses were not and, although left of centre himself, he charmed the likes of health secretary Virginia Bottomley and influential Tory peer Baroness Julia Cumberlege, persuading them to really engage with the mental health agenda. Ray was a consummate networker and a charismatic figure who loved the good life. Always a maverick, he bought champagne for every ward to celebrate the wedding of Prince Charles and Diana while he was running Tooting Bec Hospital in south London.
Popular figure
He persuaded the Croydon Advertiser to make him ballet correspondent so he could get free tickets to Covent Garden, later becoming involved in arranging dance performances in mental health settings. A naturally entrepreneurial spirit, he reinvented himself many times during the course of his career. More recently he Rich career set up a spa hotel in Kerala, In 1976, he joined the Kent India, then three years ago and Canterbury Hospital to he moved to Spain, settling train as an SRN and 18 months in Competa, a hillside town later moved to mid-Wales in the south, where he ran a when he secured a post as an popular restaurant. RCN officer, doubling the He became a popular figure organisation’s local membership around the town, and was in his three years there. 1952-2014 sometimes spotted wearing He moved on to the post of Mental health nurse and leading healthcare figure, the RCN fellowship medal director of nursing at the Royal who was a force to be reckoned with right to the end of which he was so proud. Marsden Hospital in Sutton Ray was a force to be and there followed a rich and swinging ward doors with domestic reckoned with right to the end when he varied career with roles including front doors (with doorbells) so people died of pancreatitis. His funeral took RCN management adviser, chief felt more at home. He was also one place in Spain on October 23 and a executive officer of West Lambeth of the first to introduce picture cards memorial event will be held in London Community Mental Health Trust, so patients with learning disabilities in December to celebrate his life. director of the Institute of Health could choose their meals. He is survived by his partner Services Management and director Following his early move into nurse Tom Sobel and by his two daughters, of the Department of Health’s high management, he became one of the few Helen and Elizabeth. secure services. He was also high profile openly gay NHS leaders Janet Snell is deputy editor, made a visiting professor at the in the late 1980s and early 1990s, a Nursing Standard University of York. 34 october 29 ::from vol 29 no 9 :: 2014 STANDARD Downloaded RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Oct 08, 2015. For personal use only. NoNURSING other uses without permission. Copyright © 2015 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
Ray Rowden A MAVERICK WHO CHALLENGED THE ESTABLISHMENT AND STOOD UP FOR HIS PATIENTS, WRITES JANET SNELL Nursing has lost one of its most flamboyant and colourful characters with the death of inspirational mental health nurse Ray Rowden at the age of just 62. Ray spent his life challenging the establishment, including at times the RCN leadership, so it was somewhat ironic that he was awarded that most establishment of accolades, an RCN fellowship, in 2013 in recognition of his major contribution to the profession. Born in 1952 in Whitstable, Kent, in modest circumstances, he attended the local secondary modern, emerging with no qualifications. He went to work as a nursing auxiliary at St Augustine’s Hospital in Kent and started his registered mental nurse training there in 1970. He began making waves as a nursing student activist and became one of the first nurse whistleblowers when he spoke out about poor standards of care at the hospital.
But it is for his work in mental health that he will be best remembered. Always ambitious for his patients, while working in south London he pioneered treatment strategies and a more enlightened approach to dealing with black mental health patients – ideas that were novel at the time but are taken for granted now. He knew what it meant to make patients feel human, for example he replaced
familiar figure in a pink shirt with his feet on the desk at meetings. He was political in a way other senior nurses were not and, although left of centre himself, he charmed the likes of health secretary Virginia Bottomley and influential Tory peer Baroness Julia Cumberlege, persuading them to really engage with the mental health agenda. Ray was a consummate networker and a charismatic figure who loved the good life. Always a maverick, he bought champagne for every ward to celebrate the wedding of Prince Charles and Diana while he was running Tooting Bec Hospital in south London.
Popular figure
He persuaded the Croydon Advertiser to make him ballet correspondent so he could get free tickets to Covent Garden, later becoming involved in arranging dance performances in mental health settings. A naturally entrepreneurial spirit, he reinvented himself many times during the course of his career. More recently he Rich career set up a spa hotel in Kerala, In 1976, he joined the Kent India, then three years ago and Canterbury Hospital to he moved to Spain, settling train as an SRN and 18 months in Competa, a hillside town later moved to mid-Wales in the south, where he ran a when he secured a post as an popular restaurant. RCN officer, doubling the He became a popular figure organisation’s local membership around the town, and was in his three years there. 1952-2014 sometimes spotted wearing He moved on to the post of Mental health nurse and leading healthcare figure, the RCN fellowship medal director of nursing at the Royal who was a force to be reckoned with right to the end of which he was so proud. Marsden Hospital in Sutton Ray was a force to be and there followed a rich and swinging ward doors with domestic reckoned with right to the end when he varied career with roles including front doors (with doorbells) so people died of pancreatitis. His funeral took RCN management adviser, chief felt more at home. He was also one place in Spain on October 23 and a executive officer of West Lambeth of the first to introduce picture cards memorial event will be held in London Community Mental Health Trust, so patients with learning disabilities in December to celebrate his life. director of the Institute of Health could choose their meals. He is survived by his partner Services Management and director Following his early move into nurse Tom Sobel and by his two daughters, of the Department of Health’s high management, he became one of the few Helen and Elizabeth. secure services. He was also high profile openly gay NHS leaders Janet Snell is deputy editor, made a visiting professor at the in the late 1980s and early 1990s, a Nursing Standard University of York. 34 october 29 ::from vol 29 no 9 :: 2014 STANDARD Downloaded RCNi.com by ${individualUser.displayName} on Oct 08, 2015. For personal use only. NoNURSING other uses without permission. Copyright © 2015 RCNi Ltd. All rights reserved.
