Bush nurse

John Wright tried several jobs before he found his calling in remote health care.

Story Kerry Sharp  Photo Andrew Watson

Baby John Wright jumped the starter’s gun when he was born, suddenly arriving in the back of a car rushing his mum to hospital. His dramatic delivery was perhaps a premonition of things to come in a fast-paced adult life of farming, shearing, tank-building, studying, truck-driving and a host of other jobs – before giving them all up to be a bush nurse.

The father of 3 thrives on the hectic demands of his role as nurse education and research coordinator at Tennant Creek Hospital in the NT’s remote Barkly district. He’s also a part-time Flinders University teaching academic – and when not demonstrating emergency life-saving techniques or presenting other staff training needs, he volunteers with and leads the local SES unit. John was also a voluntary board member and facilitator with Australia’s peak representative body for remote health, CRANAplus, for an impressive 19 years until 2024.

A typical working day for the energetic Barkly health professional starts early in his hospital office answering a mountain of emails, before dashing off to a hospital management group meeting. Later, he’ll be writing training packages, providing staff orientation, presenting tuition for student nurses, mostly from Flinders and Charles Darwin universities, or being stand-in or on-call hospital manager.

John drives hundreds of kilometres a day when needed to deliver staff training at outlying Barkly community health centres. “I’ve long been keen to present bush-based training,” John says. “We had some barriers to overcome but my bosses strongly support it. It’s a good fit because I’m based here and keen, understand working in remote locations from my own experience, and it’s more time-wise and economical for me to go bush than for the nurses to come into town.”