Welcome to the first post of the QUB Mental Health Nursing Students Blog.
The purpose of this blog.
What is Mental Wellness
Hello and welcome to the first post in our Blog for Mental Health Nursing within the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Queens University Belfast. As an introduction let’s start by asking what we mean by Mental Health? Mental Health includes our emotional, physical, psychological, social, and spiritual well-being. It impacts our biology, how we think, feel, and behave. Over the course of your life all your experiences contribute to how you view yourself, the world, other people and of course how you think other people view you. There are a great many factors which contribute to Mental ill health as well as Mental wellness or fitness.
All your life experiences as your move through life especially those childhood and young adult years: Your genetic/biological/family history/social history. All these factors influence your vulnerability and resilience which contribute to your Mental wellness.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) ‘Mental health is not just the absence of mental disorder. It is defined as a state of well-being in which every individual realises their own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to contribute to their community’
It is probably fair to say that Mental Health is more than this, for example what is ‘normal’ for one person may not be ‘normal’ for another and what do we mean by ‘work’ and the ability to ‘contribute’ to the community? These are the concepts that a Mental Health Nurse can and does work with effectively with every day and in part denotes the complexities each Mental Health Nurse and of course Mental Health Nursing student must consider with those they care for.
What is a Mental Health Nurse?
This at first glance would appear to be a straightforward question to answer but it is easier to describe what a Mental Health Nurse does, their responsibilities and the environments in which they work than what they are. According to the RCN ‘Mental Health Nurses work in a variety of settings and support and treat people who have been diagnosed with a mental illness’. Again, probably a limited definition as Mental Health nurses will work with people who have not been diagnosed with a mental illness but who need support for a variety of reasons. It is true to say we do work with individuals to promote mental wellness by building good therapeutic relationships, assisting them to engage with helpful coping behaviours and engaging as early as we can with not only the service user but their carers. There is of course still a stigma associated with Mental ill health with people often not getting the help they need in a timely fashion or at all, which contributes to the complexities a Mental Health Nurse must manage.
It is our hope this Blog will serve as a platform for Students, staff, Nurses, and the wider community to discuss practice issues related to Mental Health Nursing, Psychological Wellness, and points of good practice. Ultimately, we wish to support and promote Mental Health Nursing and Psychological Well-being.
Well done Colin and the Mental Health Team this is a timely initiative with a quality and informed intro. It has added value in timing, given last Sunday was Mental Health Nurses’ Day. I have no doubt this resource will become an informing and provoking source of knowledge. Congratulations everyone!!
Very good write up. Great job. Congratulations.
Thank you Colin.
It’s always reassuring for me to be reminded about the role of a mental health nurse, because I am the only ‘non-nurse’ on the Mental Health Teaching Team in our School here at QUB. There would be a danger of feeling isolated, or ‘othered’ as a result. Luckily for me, that is not the case. What I do feel is an incredible sense of synergy between us as a team, between the wealth of applied expertise, and research insights from a public mental health perspective. It’s working well and gladly so because this is how it should work, in my humble opinion [and according to most evidence!]
In mental health and physical health realms we see so many reports about quality of care suffering due to ‘silos’ and difficult transitions, where we can leave people floundering, or seem to let them down [or worse, we lose people through cracks in the systems]. That notion of a patient/client with mental health problems being “one of yours” within the health service, as in – ‘othered’ – is still pervasive in our health systems and that really has to change. We all have to work together – it’s not a choice.
I feel we have found that synergy in our teaching team and it’s a rare thing, so I like to shout about it! We genuinely recognise the added value that can be realised from interprofessional and inter-disciplinary work. We have a shared sense of culture, open and transparent communication, genuine mutual respect and a desire to support each other. Get us! 💫
We are much more similar, than we are different, regardless of the colourful and varied experience we all bring to the team. I feel this resonates with the role of a mental health nurse and all nurses, in that we are all human, and that we embrace all the colours that can bring! 🌈
Hi Colin great to see the blog up and running, Derek