What is a Mental Health Nurse?
Mental health has become a highly recognised issue over the past few years, with a number of campaigns and charities promoting the acceptance of mental struggles and assisting with rehabilitation. Mental health illness requires the patience and expertise of mental health nurses, who are specially trained professionals with a good knowledge of mental ill health theory. They apply this knowledge in practice and adopt a warm and empathetic persona in order to put patients at ease.
Mental health nurses also need to prepare for the potential risks that come with their position. Due to the nature of their state of mind, and depending on their condition, there is potential for patients to become violent with healthcare professionals. Mental health workers are expected to observe and communicate with patients who show building levels of tension and diffuse the situation accordingly.
Working in mental health is a diverse and engaging profession, taking nurses into a variety of settings, such as male and female acute, low and medium secure, older adult, child and adult, mother and baby, forensic and psychiatric intensive care.