Nurse Iain Keenan is being held up as a shining example after smashing through stereotypes to make it in a world dominated by women.

For a sports-mad bloke with few formal qualifications and little sense of direction, nursing old people seemed an unlikely option.

For a start, when Iain went for careers advice, nursing for men was still a bit of a "taboo".

Shining example : Iain cares for the elderly at Southend Hospital Picture: TERENCE BUNCH

Thirteen years down the line, Iain has shown just how crazy stereotyping can be.

The 29-year-old father of two young daughters has worked his way up from health care assistant in the old Rochford Hospital to clinical development nurse for care of the elderly at Southend.

En route he has tucked a degree in specialist nursing under his belt and worked his way through the nursing ranks, including district nurse in a tough inner-city area and ward manager.

So Iain seemed an ideal person for Essex Strategic Health Authority to nominate to take part in the NHS's special leadership programme for nurses working with older people.

Today, Iain was explaining to the health authority exactly what is going on in Southend to implement the Government's National Service Framework for Older people - one of priority areas for the Health Service.

The hospital, which boasts zero age discrimination, proves the claim is not just idle spin by providing regular dialysis sessions for 94-year-old kidney patient Percy Yeomans.

Percy, of Westcliff, is believed to be the oldest renal patient in the country.

The hospital also invited older patients and their relatives and carers to discuss age discrimination, filming the session for use in staff training.

Iain said: "If we did discriminate we would be failing a high percentage of our patients. We are not talking about a small minority of people."

Published Wednesday, January 29, 2003

Brought to you by the Evening Echo

Brought to you by the Evening Echo