Elizabeth Grace Neill

Started the System of Nursing Registration (1846 to 1926) Elizabeth Grace Campbell Neil received her nursing education at the St. Johns House Sisterhood in London. She spent her early nursing career as lady superintendent at the Pendlebury Hospital for Children in Manchester, where Ms. Campbell met her husband Channing Neil. She left England for Australia in 1886, and then, treaded a life of a journalist and various government commissions for almost 10 years in New Zealand beginning 1891. Neil was back in health care upon the establishment of the New Zealands Department of Health, creating a nursing service. 1901 came, and Neil got the privilege of helping draft a bill aimed to protect the public from nursing malpractice for New Zealand Parliament, one that became the worlds first Nurses Registration Act. Soon after, the Midwives Registration Act was passed and Neil was given the task of setting up the very first state maternity hospital, the St. Helens Hospital, which opened in 1905 and followed by 3 more in a span of 2 years.