A theatre nurse is a registered nurse who primarily focuses on operations, surgeries, and procedures. They work closely with the operating team and are responsible for a number of tasks through preoperative, anaesthetic, surgical, and recovery phases. Theatre nurses work with patients at their most vulnerable time, offering a uniquely rewarding yet challenging role. They work primarily in hospital operating theatres and anaesthetic/recovery areas, but they can also be involved with procedures on wards, clinics, or in other specialist areas. Some of the duties of a theatre nurse include:

• Providing nursing care before, during, and after patients undergo surgery or a non-surgical procedure.
• Assessing patients and ensuring critical medical history items are communicated to the surgical team.
• Educating patients and their families, ensuring they’re prepared for surgery and post-surgery care.
• Collaborating with other medical professionals such as surgeons.
• Being involved in all four steps of a patient’s journey: preoperative, anaesthetic, surgical, and recovery phases.

To become a theatre nurse, one needs to be a registered nurse and undergo specialist training, including courses to consolidate the specialist skills required to work in theatre. A good theatre nurse needs to have a calm and friendly disposition to help develop the rapport and trust of patients in a short period of time. The ability to remain calm and communicate and listen carefully in a crisis situation is also imperative, especially in a busy and noisy operating theatre. Theatre nursing requires a special breed of people with an exceptional amount of patience.