Slight pessimism in orthopaedic nurses (5)
I believe the answer is:
minor
'slight' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'pessimism in orthopaedic nurses' is the wordplay.
'nurses' indicates a hidden word (nurse can mean holding closely).
'MINOR' is hidden in the letters of 'pessimism in orthopaedic'.
(Other definitions for minor that I've seen before include "Of small importance" , "Small-scale - child" , "Slight; little known" , "Smaller - child" , "Less important" .)