A fair kick o’ the ba’ – #MHNursesday
21 Feb 2019 marks the first ever UK Mental Health Nurses day. The focus of the day is to gather together voices and experiences from across the UK to celebrate, describe and promote Mental Health Nursing. To mark this Mental Health Nurses Day, we asked a number of our friends, Fellows and Queen’s Nurses to write about various aspects around being a mental health nurse. We have three to highlight during the day. Our final piece has been written by Queen’s Nurse Kelvin Frew, and looks at how positive change in mental health nursing can be made with a fair kick…
Being Mindful of the Carers
This award-winning project aimed to pilot a Mindfulness based Cognitive Therapy programme to carers of people with dementia and assess its effectiveness.
Dementia Pathways
This project aims to develop and implement an integrated health and social care pathway to provide support for older adults (over 65 years) living with dementia and their carers in the community co-ordinated by a named community nurse. This nurse will ensure equitable access to support, information and care from diagnosis throughout all stages of the illness to end of life.
Enabling Recovery
This project offers a safe environment for adults with learning disabilities and mental health conditions can be enabled to better understand, manage and maintain their own wellbeing. The aim will be for each individual to identify what they are like when they are well, and when they are unwell, promoting an individual definition of recovery.
Living Well with Dementia: Enhancing Dignity & Quality of Life, Using A Novel Intervention, Dignity Therapy
Dignity Therapy is a brief intervention that enhances the lives of people at the end of life; this project aimed to determine its effectiveness with people with early dementia.
Moving On
This project is an evaluation of a Community Psychiatric Nurse-led, public and social partnering practice-based study, aimed at helping people make the transition from homelessness care services to local community networks.
My Juno Anniversary – the Importance of Perinatal Mental Health Support
Tess Askew is a co-founder of Juno, a perinatal support group, discussing her personal story and the importance of good mental health. My first born Ethan – the boy who came along and healed many things in my life, stole my heart and made myself and Chris a family with so much to love for – was born in 2013. He turns 4 soon and this means that I have been accessing and then facilitating peer support for 3 years. My Juno anniversary if you will! My labour and Ethan’s birth were what I would consider traumatic and the start…
Reflection on 30 years as a Mental Health Nurse – #mhnursesday
21st Feb 2019 marks the first ever UK Mental Health Nurses day. The point of the day is to to gather together voices and experiences from across the UK to celebrate, describe and promote Mental Health Nursing. To mark this Mental Health Nurses Day, we asked a number of our friends, Fellows and Queen’s Nurses to write blogs on various aspects around being a mental health nurse. We have three to highlight during the day. Our first is a reflective look at a long and varied career in mental health nursing from our Fellow, Derek Barron, Director of Care at…
Safer Communities
This project sought to pilot two new initiatives: Improve assessment and signposting for people who maybe more vulnerable to risk of domestic fires With a local housing provider and tenants, pilot a Good Neighbour, Good Neighbourhood initiative to support people to feel safer in their community.
Three pieces of advice for a community placement!
Ruth-Ann Welsh, Undergraduate prizewinner for Abertay University offers some words of wisdom. As a first year mental health nursing student I had very little knowledge about the role of a community mental health nurse or the challenges that lay ahead, I would like to start my blog by offering three pieces of advice for students about to venture out on their first community placement: Avoid wearing thin trousers or tights, house cats seem to instinctively identify fabric that ladders with ease. Budgies, although adorable, are prone to bouts of verbal abuse; try not to take it personally. Be flexible- you…