Canberra nurse dedicated to helping veterans revisit war sites

As a 17-year-old nursing student in Canberra, she would often find herself caring for World War I veterans, and grew used to listening to their stories.

Later, as a registered nurse, she cared for veterans of the Second World War, a more familiar part of history, as she had family members who had served overseas.

When a position came up in the Department of Veterans Affairs that involved caring for veterans, she didn’t hesitate to apply.

Almost a decade later, she is being awarded a Public Service Medal for her work, which has involved helping more than 260 Australian war veterans safely attend more than 22 commemorations in 11 different countries.

It’s a process that involves several layers of healthcare, relationship building and logistics, as most veterans have complex health issues that makes travelling overseas a risky undertaking.

But Ms Gallagher says the journey is so important that all the underlying logistics make it well worth it.

“This is often a big significant thing in their lives, and often they've never been back to where they actually fought,” she said.

“They've got a lot of memories there of comrades they lost, friends they lost, what happened to their battalions or their groups they belonged to, so it's very much an emotional time for them.”

Her work involves organising medical assessments, liaising with the Foreign Affairs Department and local medical facilities to ensure veterans’ visits go smoothly.

“We develop really good working relationships with them beforehand to make sure they're still fit to go, because we go on long-hauls - to London, to Crete, and into PNG,” she said.

“They're quite remote places with limited medical support, so we make sure that they're fit to travel. And there's also the psychological side, because often they know when they go back, they're saying goodbye to their friends and they're towards the end of their life, so they'll never get to do this again. They're closing some chapters in their life about some of the memories they have, some of the history that happened.”

She said visiting the sites of former prisoner of war camps, like Changi and Hellfire Pass, had been particularly emotional.

“It just makes you really realise how hard it was, and the stories that come back that they haven't shared before. Often they'll tell the nurses because I guess they feel it will comfort them.”

Ms Gallagher has cared for veterans ranging from a 106-year-old war widow to young veterans in their 20s.

She said it was a privilege to receive a medal for her work, even though she didn’t see her work as extraordinary.

“It's a real honour to be able to be involved - I never thought when I went nursing as a 17-year-old that I'd do something like this.”