Contemporary Psychiatric-mental Health NursingMillions of people worldwide suffer from mental health disorders. In fact, five of the leading causes of disability in the world today are psychiatric in nature. Psychiatric-mental health nursing is a specialized area that employs a wide range of explanatory theories and research on human behavior as its science and the purposeful use of self as its art. Understanding people who are searching for meaning through interaction in complex times demands the most authoritative and contemporary knowledge and clinical competence. It is through the power of knowledge and clinical competence that psychiatric-mental health nurses can help clients from diverse cultures to live with uncertainty, unfamiliarity and unpredictability and to pursue creative healing on psychobiologic and spiritual levels. Our goal for this textbook,Contemporary Psychiatric-Mental Health Nursing,and its companion supplements is to provide students and practicing psychiatric-mental health nurses with the most up-to-date, evidence-based, culturally competent, authoritative, comprehensive resource available and to present it in an accessible, clinically relevant, and professional format. UNDERLYING THEMESThroughout this textbook, we as authors try to remain true to values of humanism, interactionism, cultural competence, the relevance of meaning, and the importance of empathy and empowerment in the nurse-client relationship. We believe that psychiatric-mental health nursing is concerned with the quality of human life and its relationship to optimal psychobiologic health, feelings of self-worth, personal integrity, self-fulfillment, spirituality, and creative expression. The psychiatric-mental health nurse's scope of practice is broad enough to include issues such as alienation, identity crises, sudden life changes, and troubled family relationships. It may involve issues of poverty and affluence, cross-cultural disparities in access to health care, and the human experiences of birth, death, and loss. Psychiatric-mental health nursing is concerned with sustaining and enhancing the mental health of both the individual and the group, while its practice locale is often found in the community. In exploring the theme of global mental health, each unit of this book opens with compelling photographs and stories of individuals from around the world who face a variety of mental health issues. By presenting the readers with this global perspective, we hope to promote awareness of the relevance of those same global issues in our own culturally diverse society. Along these lines, we selected a Mandela to represent the essence of this book.Mandelais the Sanskrit word for circle and symbolizes wholeness or organization around a unifying center. The goal of this book is to explore science, art, and spirituality as a path toward our shared vision of global mental health. It is synthesis of elements important to a holistic view. The Mandela used throughout this book and on its cover is entitled The Great Mother, created by Cynthia Cunningham Baxter. It consists of hands and a mother tree, which is consistent with nursing's goals of care, compassion, and comfort. CONTEMPORARY TRENDS The themes, ideas, knowledge, tools, and organization of this textbook were expressly designed for psychiatric-mental health nursing students and clinicians who are committed to developing the habits of mind, responsibility, and practice that will make a difference in view of contemporary trends. Specifically, this text prepares students to tailor and humanize interventions for traditional as well as "new" psychiatricmental health clients often encountered in forensic settings, homeless shelters, and in other community-based and rehabilitation-oriented settings.Furthermore, because advances in neuroscience and the study of the human genome are redefining our conception of the basis for mental disorders, a solid grounding in psychobiology is threaded throughout the book. Brain imaging assessment and concise yet comprehensive information on the expanding array of psychopharmacologic treatment is yet another strong emphasis. We recognize that psychiatric-mental health clients are racially and culturally diverse and include growing numbers of mentally ill elders, children, adolescents, and people with coexisting substance use disorders or comorbidities with other chronic illnesses such as HIV/AIDS. Therefore, we devote separate chapters to each of the above topics. We feel confident in entitling this bookContemporary Psychiatric-Mental Health Nursingbecause of its explicit links to contemporary trends in our field. ORGANIZATIONThe detailed table of contents at the beginning of the book makes its clear organization easy to follow. The book is divided into five parts. Unit I clusters six chapters that provide comprehensive coverage of the theoretic basis for psychiatric-mental health nursing. In Unit II, we address topics traditionally associated with psychiatric-mental health nursing, such as using the nursing process, therapeutic communication, assessment, advocacy and client rights, and creating a therapeutic environment. Unit III focuses on caring for clients with specific DSMIV-TR mental disorders. First, we outline the defining characteristics of each disorder, then we cover the biopsychosocial theories necessary to understand them, and finally we apply the nursing process to caring for clients with these disorders. Unit IV shifts the focus to vulnerable populations that require comfort and care from `psychiatric-mental health nurses. These populations include people at risk for self-destructive behavior, abuse, or violence; psychiatric-mental health clients with HIV/AIDS; and specific age groups. Unit V of the book provides authoritative coverage of nursing intervention strategies and desired outcomes, including a wide range of modalities, from individual, group, and family interventions to psychopharmacology and complementary and alternative healing practices. Throughout the book, experts contributed their knowledge and skills on all the topics covered. FEATURESThe following noteworthy features weave together the threads of research, theory, and practice into a comprehensive and contemporary fabric of knowledge and competencies essential to psychiatric-mental health nursing. The content and processes are clearly applicable to the care of identified psychiatric-mental health clients, yet they are also relevant when integrated into the care of all those with whom we interact as professional nurses.
The following supplements were developed to supportContemporary Psychiatric-Mental Health Nursingand enhance both the student and instructor experiences in this course:
Psychiatric-mental health nursing is poised at a crossroads. We are challenged to bring complex thinking to a complex world if we are to actualize our contribution to global mental health—the vision to which this text is dedicated. This book has been crafted to provide you with the best possible evidence generated in research to help you achieve your goal of excellence in practice. It offers a fully integrated bio/psycho/social perspective rather than relying on any single theory or ideology. It encourages you to become personally, professionally, and spiritually willing to muster the courage and hope necessary to forge proactive steps in our future and to make a commitment to work globally in a contemporary landscape and mindscape. We have the opportunity to forge a new synthesis of professional wisdom in face of tough mind-body-spirit problems and needs. We need to face the new millennium's critical transitions with intelligence, stamina, wit, creativity, skill, and moral courage. Global mental health can become a shared emergent vision constructed in a way that is respectful of the rich diversity of the citizens of our contemporary world. We created this book to provide you with a map, a compass, and the inspiration to succeed in your current work. We hope that it encourages you to become a participant and leader in facing the broader challenges ahead of us. Carol Ren Kneisl |
