PROFESSOR Charlotte Searle, doyen of the South African nursing profession, died quietly in her home at Greyton in the Western Cape on Sunday. Her daughter, Lilian Haynes, said Searle, a tireless fighter for nurses’ rights, was 91. A founder member of both the SA Nursing Council and the SA Nursing Association, Searle was also president of Sana for 10 years. She wrote the definitive history of nursing in South Africa and this and her other books have been the standard works for successive generations of nursing students for many years. Haynes said that in 1941, Searle was responsible for sending the first Indian woman in South Africa to train as a nurse, and in 1947 promoted the first black nurse to the position of sister in a state hospital. In 1948 she enabled black nurses to attend university courses for advanced professional education and in 1949 pioneered nurse educator courses in Afrikaans at South African universities. ”One of her proudest achievements came in 1955 when she was responsible for the introduction of the first basic nursing degree courses in Africa,” Haynes said. – Sapa