An evaluation of a mental health screening and referral pathway for community nursing care: nurses’ and general practitioners’ perspectives

Abstract

The trialled pathway, which was modified and refined following the study, is an evidence-based resource for community nurses in Australia and similar contexts to guide practise and maximise holistic care for war veterans and war widow(er)s and possibly other client groups.

Patients' perspectives on care pathways and informed shared decision making in the transition between psychiatric hospitalization and the community

“…Research has provided evidence of the benefits of increased patient involvement and raised the visibility of the service user, redefining integrated care and moving beyond policy aspiration . A study about patients' knowledge and the power imbalance in the doctor‐patient relationship supports our findings that patients need knowledge and power to participate in a shared decision‐making process . The study offered several recommendations for enhancing this by simplifying the trialled pathway and accompanying guidelines and strategies to improve communication between nurses and general practitioners (GPs).…”

“…[9][10][11] A study about patients' knowledge and the power imbalance in the doctor-patient relationship supports our findings that patients need knowledge and power to participate in a shared decision-making process. 12 The study offered several recommendations for enhancing this by simplifying the trialled pathway and accompanying guidelines and strategies to improve communication between nurses and general practitioners (GPs). However, a discourse analysis of the concept of patient involvement pointed out the implications for the role of mental health nurses and concluded that they may need to relinquish power if true involvement of patients is to occur.…”

Care pathways in the transition of patients between district psychiatric hospital centres (DPCs) and community mental health services

“…Some of the communication strategies to meet the needs of patients should focus on a better sharing of knowledge through enhanced teamwork and interprofessional collaboration. Annells et al found that the sharing of knowledge ensured an effective referral process. This finding was also described by Beach and Oates, who found that a key aspect of the work of mental health nurses is sharing information about individuals through records.…”

Half Full or Half Empty: The Measurement of Mental Health and Mental Illness in Emerging Australian Adults

“…looking to remove cases of depression and anxiety from a sample). Indeed, single dimension measures and short-form screening tools are known to be highly advantageous for providing brief, standardised, easily administered and cost-effective methods of identifying, and prompting referrals to further services for, untreated mental health problems (Annells et al, 2010;Cappelli et al, 2012;Husky, Sheridan, McGuire, & Olfson, 2011). Rather, the authors intend to emphasise the need to exercise caution in the administration and interpretation of mental health measures and to always consider the risk of using mental health measures interchangeably to assess general mental health or mental illness, without due consideration to the possible consequences of misinterpretation of scores or categories for such groups and individuals.…”

“…However, given that brief, single dimensions measures may be widely used as initial screening tools, for ease, convenience or speed of assessment, or to gain a brief snapshot of psychological health in combination with other measures (e.g. demographics, physical health) and across settings (Annells et al, 2010;Cappelli et al, 2012;Husky, Sheridan, McGuire, & Olfson, 2011), this limitation also draws attention to problems and concerns associated with this practice. While previous research on the GHQ has confirmed the measure as an appropriate tool for its original purpose, to detect "psychiatric morbidity", it is clear that as a popular and well-validated instrument, it may be employed for purposes beyond this (Winzer et al, 2014).…”