Compassionate care within mental health services is often taken for granted as something that can be made visible and authentic. However, recent government reports and policy suggest that we are far from providing compassionate care and may be more focused upon risk and surveillance. This paper will discuss the visibility of compassionate care and explore outcomes that consumers and practitioners could measure in practice. Separating the fact from fiction within compassionate care will make authentic involvement practices more visible and open to discussion around consumer collaboration. In a qualitative analysis of a small study with mental health consumers, compassion was found to be a major factor in whether consumers became more involved in their own health care. Demonstrating compassionate care may therefore also demonstrate consumer participation and engagement. This paper will argue that compassionate care can be observed in the relationships between practitioners and consumers that are collaborative and use presence and persistence as methods of practice. Emancipatory practices can be made more visible in mental health care in order to make compassion measurable and to encourage consumer participation and engagement.
Government policy has directed local services to address the needs of carers as a way of maintaining care in the community. This study was initiated to enable carers to develop an information pack based upon their identified needs. Co-operative inquiry, was the method used to ensure full participation of the carers. Group meetings were already in existence through a charity organisation which provides a carers support network. The first author participated in a number of carers group meetings. Co-operative inquiry was used to clarify a number of themes identified and reflective cycles ensured that those themes remained relevant. It was found that carers do want to be involved in their relative's care, not as passive recipients but as collaborative care providers. To do this they need to be fully informed of the processes of care provision. Carers need information that is relevant, easily accessible and obtainable in varying degrees of comprehension. This study suggests that a culture shift within mental health nursing is necessary if professionals are to recognise that a perceived lack of support may lead to a breakdown in relationships between the carer, the person being cared for and the professionals.
Social policy greatly influences the working environment of mental health nurses but in practice can be difficult to translate. Empowerment of service users is one area that is constantly significant in policy, locally and nationally, yet quite difficult to define in practice. This ethnomethodological study explored the practice of 10 mental health nurses working in an acute admissions unit. Through semi-structured interviews, the nurses were asked to discuss the taken-for-granted methods of empowerment with individual service users, their families and with work colleagues. The results were thematically analysed and compared with international findings, which reflected an awareness among mental health nurses of empowering practice in four areas. These were: Working with mental illness, Making connections, Responsibility and Teamworking.
Academic writing is an important aspect of professional development for students and lecturers. It is one way in which they demonstrate their learning, but it can be a difficult skill to master. This article aims to enable students and professionals to develop their academic writing style using a coherent and effective framework.
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