Tourette’s syndrome and my nursing career: the support that helps

Tourette’s may present challenges in a clinical role, but can also enhance empathy with patients. A nurse describes the value of workplace and colleague support

I was in my thirties and working as a clinical lead nurse in a care home when I started making involuntary and uncontrollable sounds and movements, also known as tics.

On an average day I would experience a full spectrum of verbal and motor tics , including swearing tics – known as coprolalia – and involuntarily using a range of random words and phrases, and even speaking with different accents. The tics affected every part of my life and I worried about what it meant for my nursing career.

Verbal and motor tics affected my ability