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Biomedical subjects

E Shanley

Publications and source records attributed to E Shanley.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2003

Partnership in coping: an Australian system of mental health nursing.

The paper identifies shortcomings of approaches used in organizing and delivering mental health nursing. It provides a rationale for the development of a new system of mental health nursing namely the Partnership in Coping system (PinC). This system has been developed by service users, clinical mental health nurses and an academic mental health nurse. Currently, it is undergoing trials in Western Australia. The PinC focuses on the strengths of clients. It uses the positive aspects of mental health nursing namely its holistic perspective, the length and nature of the informal contacts, the 'ordinariness' of relationships with clients and the nurse's knowledge of the clients' social and physical environments. It is a versatile system that can also be used across different mental health settings (community and inpatient facilities). The paper describes the philosophy behind the system, the concept of coping, the nature of the partnership between the client and nurse and their respective roles.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed2001

Survey of stakeholders' opinions of community psychiatric nursing services.

The paper describes a telephone survey of the views of representatives of users, purchasers and providers of community psychiatric nursing services on services in Scotland. The telephone interview protocol was based on seven themes derived from interviewing 63 users, purchasers and providers throughout the UK. Descriptive statistics were used to present the responses in the survey to the forced choice questions. Responses to the open ended questions were coded, categorized and computed. The paper describes the responses by the major stakeholders to each of the themes. Overall, the quality of the existing services was placed in the 'good' category. However, criticism was directed at the insufficient numbers of Community Psychiatric Nurses in the service, the inadequate amount of time spent with clients and their poorly organized method of working. Other findings and stakeholders' recommendations are discussed.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed2001

Common experiences of mental health nurses and consumers: ingredients of a symbiotic relationship?

Examination of the history of consumers and mental health nurses reveals that both consumers and mental health nurses have much in common in terms of their powerlessness and their sense of being undervalued. This paper argues that their common problems have a shared solution. It is in the interest of both groups to develop a symbiotic relationship, with each other benefiting by achieving greater influence over the delivery of care. The development of a close alliance requires a change in perception and behaviour towards each other. This paper identifies some of the factors militating against developing a symbiotic relationship and suggests possible ways of addressing them.

Helplessness, Learned↗
PubMed2001

Misplaced confidence in a profession's ability to safeguard the public?

A major requirement of a profession is to safeguard the public in providing a valid and reliable means of admitting to practice only those who will meet minimum requirements. Nursing uses two different forms of assessment (clinical and academic assessments) in attempting to discriminate between those who are likely to be safe and competent to practice and those who are not. The paper reviews the literature on systems of assessment with a specific focus on Behaviourally Anchored Rating Scales (BARS) and Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE). The conclusion drawn is that the methods described are inadequate in predicting/assessing the clinical performance of nurses. An implication for the nursing profession is the possible loss of confidence in its ability to safeguard the public.

Clinical Competence↗
PubMed1999

A descriptive survey to identify the perceived skills and community skill requirements of mental health staff.

Throughout the 1990s mental health care has shifted from a hospital to a community-based service. Government policy indicates that staff require further education as a result of the shift to community care. However, none of the United Kingdom policy documents or mental health literature prescribes what education is required. Consequently this multidisciplinary study aimed to identify what skills, if any, were required by hospital-based staff to move to a community-based working environment. Study findings suggest advantages in perceiving skills as overlapping and interconnecting. Five common core skills and skill differences between professional groups are identified. It is argued that core skills are central and common to all groups and specialist skills are those that distinguish professional groups one from another and different grades of staff within professional groups. While problems of multidisciplinary education are considered, nevertheless a case is made for educating staff in core skills within a multidisciplinary environment which may be beneficial in achieving community care goals.

Community Mental Health Services↗
PubMed1998

Complementary therapies as a means of developing the scope of professional nursing practice.

The development of the extended role in nursing has been seen by some as primarily a means for nurses taking on tasks that have traditionally been the work of junior doctors. Others object to this view and ascribe to the 'new nursing' perspective of Salvage. She sees the extended role as moving towards increasing autonomy and operating in a professional rather than a bureaucratic occupational model. This view militates against the development of nurses as mini-doctors. This paper discusses the controversy surrounding the development of the extended role, focusing particularly on the use of complementary therapies as a legitimate component of the 'new nurses' role.

Complementary Therapies↗
PubMed1998

Evaluation of a course for charge nurses on caring for people with dementia.

The provision by nurses of appropriate levels of care for people with dementia is considered to be adversely affected by the inadequate provision of post basic education. This paper reports on a study that seeks to evaluate the effectiveness of a brief educational programme for charge nurses caring for people with dementia. In addition it focuses on behavioural change resulting from the course, for example, the degree of involvement of relatives in the care of their family member. The course is seen as a model for short courses for nurses working in this area. Qualitative methodology was utilized involving questionnaires and focused group interviews. The evaluation of the course incorporated pre- and post-test design. The study identified factors that enhanced the charge nurses' educational experience. These factors included a course design incorporating andragogical teaching methods and the implementation of an action plan. The study also highlighted problems experienced by charge nurses in implementing an action plan. The action plan demonstrated that the type of involvement of relatives is more complex than presupposed and depended on such factors as the fear experienced by the relative of being left with the responsibility to care for their family member should they offer to contribute to their care in hospital. Recommendations for the design of future courses are made.

Dementia↗
PubMed1997

Caring for older people in the community.

This is a brief report of the aims and structure of a two-year project, which commenced in August 1996, researching the educational needs of nurses who care for older people in the community. The study involves the development and evaluation of an educational programme designed to help improve the efficiency of nurses working in this area.

Clinical Competence↗
PubMed1997

A descriptive study of multidisciplinary mental health staff moving to the community: the demographic and educational issues.

Mental health care philosophy has moved from the containment of patients within institutions to the integration of clients within the community. 'Caring for People' (a Department of Health report) and the subsequent legislation enshrined the philosophical shift in law. Previous policy reports had indicated that staff required training to move from hospital-based service to a community-based service, but did not propose content, and no systematic study of the needs of mental health staff has been carried out. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the skill and information needs of a group of multidisciplinary staff in preparation for the movement from hospital to community settings. The study design was a descriptive survey sampling of a total multidisciplinary population in Scotland. Data were collected using questionnaires and semistructured interviews with a small volunteer subsample of respondents. This paper presents the first set of study findings related to the demographic and educational issues. Differences between hospital and community staff and between health care assistants and qualified staff are demonstrated for demographic and educational factors. Proposals are made for managers, professionals, educators and researchers.

Community Mental Health Services↗
PubMed1988

Use of implicit criteria in evaluation of mental nurses.

This paper describes the development of an instrument based on implicit criteria currently used by mental nurses in deciding whether a nurse is a good or a poor mental nurse. Existing implicit means of assessing mental nurses in the form of ward reports have been found to be inadequate. The study consisted of two stages: firstly, the production of a preliminary questionnaire using statements describing good and poor mental nurses obtained by interviewing mental nurses; secondly, the production of an assessment instrument, the Mental Illness Nurses' Evaluation Test, derived from the results of factor analysing responses of mental nurses to the preliminary questionnaire. The criteria used to evaluate mental nurses that emerged in order of importance were benevolence-malevolence to other nurses, amiable-irascible, regard-disregard for patients, confident-uncertain, directive-non-directive and professional-unprofessional. The study exposes current values used in judging mental nurses and constitutes a first important step in developing a valid and reliable instrument in assessing mental nurses in terms of their prescribed role.

Employee Performance Appraisal↗
PubMed1981

Attitudes of psychiatric hospital staff towards mental illness.

The use of the social model of psychiatry as a form of treatment is increasingly accepted as a legitimate therapy. This is expressed in the continued growth of the 'therapeutic community' regimes. However, investigations into components of the social model, i.e. attitudes of nursing staff in psychiatric hospitals, have not accompanied this growth. A cross-section of research over the past 25 years has shown an omission of behavioural correlations in attempting to measure staff attitudes. Research into attitudes expressed indicate a correlation between age, education, regime in hospital and occupation and the responses to attitude questionnaires. Without behavioral correlations however, the value of this research is very questionable. A few studies have included behavioral correlations such as perception of staff, discharge rates and length of stay in the community. An example of an area in nursing that attitude studies with behavioral correlations could usefully be employed is in examining the effectiveness of using staff from different cultures in therapeutic communities.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed1980

Overseas nurses--effective therapeutic agents?

Factors affecting the effectiveness of overseas people employed as psychiatric nurses are discussed. Basic cultural influences, especially different value systems between the immigrant and the host population, are seen as unlikely to be greatly altered by the environment in which the immigrant nurses find themselves. In fact a greater divergence would seem more likely to occur. The different experiences of immigrant nurses compared with nurses recruited in Britain are considered under the following headings: expectations of the immigrants on entering nursing, their contact with the host culture, the reaction of the indigenous population to the immigrant, language difficulties, and the insecurity of employment. The conclusion drawn is that the cultural differences, recruitment methods, the immigrants' experiences in employment and lack of contact with the culture of the indigenous population (apart from their deviant members) are likely to adversely affect his/her ability to function as a therapeutic agent. This is particularly important where the form of treatment is based on the social model.

Clinical Competence↗
PubMedDate not supplied

External examiner system in traditional nurse education--issues to be resolved.

Nurse education is in the process of adopting the practices of higher education establishment. One such practice is the external examiner system. Unfortunately this system is not without its shortcomings. A number of potential areas of difficulty in using this system are looked at in this paper. These range from problems associated with the selection of the external examiner to the balance of power between the external examiner and the course team. It is pointed out that nurses may, in their desire for validation and increased status, leave aside their growing critical abilities and accept without reservation and to their detriment the traditional practices of the higher education system.

Clinical Competence↗