Geraldine Jordan, clinical nurse manager of the spinal unit at the Mater Hospital, Dublin, says rehabilitation begins as soon as the patients arrive.
I start my day at 7.45a.m. I work an eight-hour shift from Monday to Friday so I have every weekend off.
The first thing I do when I start work is report to the night staff.
I work on a 30-bed ward with orthopaedic and spinal injuries. Once the night staff hand over the patients' charts, I go on the doctor's round.
As I am the nurse manager I relay the information from the doctor's round to the rest of the team on duty.
Then anything could happen throughout the shift.
We get new patients in from all around the country to our spinal unit because it's the only one in the country.
Patients could be paralysed from very high up, in the cervical vertebrae or in the thoracic or lumbar spine as a result of car crashes, sports injuries or spinal tumours.
Working within the unit involves taking personal care of the patients and preparing them for theatre or post-operative care. Spinal injuries need to be closely monitored and so patients need to be turned and frequently checked for numbness or loss of sensation.
Psychological care is also very important because spinal patients are both physically and mentally in shock when they are taken to our unit.
Most of my patients would be waiting to be transferred to the rehabilitation unit in Dún Laoghaire but rehabilitation begins the moment a patient comes into the spinal ward.
Nurses apply splints to patients' legs and work closely with the nutritionists to ensure they are eating properly; we're like a Jack-of-all-trades really.
I trained as a nurse in the UK and when I moved to Ireland I worked in the Mater's spinal unit and I really enjoyed it so I stayed.
It's a very challenging job that never gets boring and you never know what to expect from one shift to the next.
The best thing about my job is making a patient feel comfortable and it's great to see a patient come back to the unit after their recovery looking so well and back to as normal as they can be.
It's an extremely rewarding job and I take pleasure in getting to know my patients.
Interview by Patricia Weston