Rise of the zombie institution, the failure of mental health nursing leadership, and mental health nursing as a zombie category

Abstract

In this paper, we propose that mental health nursing has become a zombie category, at least in the Australian context. Mental health nursing is a concept that has lost any real explanatory or conceptual power, yet nevertheless persists in public discourse and the collective imagination. In recent decades, powerful forces have contributed to the zombification of the mental health nursing workforce and the academy. An increase in medical hegemony, the ascendancy of allied health in mental health service provision, the need for uncritical and servile workers, protocol-driven work practices, and a failure of leadership to mobilize any substantial resistance to these trends have enabled the infection to spread. The recognition of zombification, active resistance against the forces that conspire to cause it, and the cultivation of genuine conscientious critical thought and debate offer the only hope of survival of mental health nursing as a thriving specialty.

Nurses' influence on consumers' experience of safety in acute mental health units: A qualitative study

“…Workload issues such as high nurse to patient ratios can also result in nurses needing to focus on tasks and crisis management (Kingston & Greenwood, 2020). Some consider nurses themselves to be a challenge, by unquestioningly adopting the dominant risk paradigm in mental health services (Lakeman & Molloy, 2018). Nurses can use the findings from this study to reorientate their practices and specifically focus on making themselves available and responsive to consumers.…”

Ways of understanding nursing in psychiatric inpatient care – A phenomenographic study

“…Understanding nursing as responding to symptoms and behaviours corresponds to the traditional mindset and medical perspective in today's psychiatric inpatient care (Bladon, ; Lakeman & Molloy, ). Similar to previous findings, risk management and reactive actions were preferred interventions in this understanding (Mullen, ).…”

“…We suggest that knowledge in nursing as an academic field is a prerequisite to attain more comprehensive understandings of nursing. The different understandings could also be related to the survival of an antiquated culture and maintaining of an old power structure in which nursing as an academic field is not accepted (Lakeman & Molloy, ). The limited understanding described in the first category has little or no relation to the vision of good nursing in psychiatric inpatient care of today (Gabrielsson et al, ) and has more resemblance to early mental institutions (Bladon, ).…”

“…Nursing in psychiatric care has been accused of a lack of autonomy and becoming instrumental by acquiescing to the medical model, mostly focusing on delivering treatments prescribed by physicians (Bladon, ; Lakeman & Molloy, ). Specifically, nursing has been described as having a marginalized status (Holmberg, Caro, & Sobis, ), unclear role definition (Delaney & Johnson, ) and being invisible (Harrison, Hauck, & Ashby, ), all of which has led to difficulties in implementation of theories and models (Barker, ; Bladon, ).…”

Share or perish: Social media and the International Journal of Mental Health Nursing

“…With the advent of social media, this opportunity is available to all mental health nurses. Making mental health nursing research, scholarship and models of practice more visible, not just to academics and researchers, may help to stave‐off Lakeman and Molloy's () predictions of mental health nursing's zombification.…”