Mental health nursing identity: a critical analysis of the UK’s Nursing and Midwifery Council’s pre-registration syllabus change and subsequent move towards genericism

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to explain how and why the philosophical changes to the pre-registration nursing standards by the UK’s Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) have resulted in a paradigm shift for mental health nursing. Design/methodology/approach This paper critically examines the changes to nursing education standards and offers an analysis of the problems associated with the shift towards a generic nursing syllabus. Findings The said shift prioritises physical health intervention, skills, procedures and tasks over the uniqueness of mental health nursing. Practical implications This paper argues that mental health nursing skills and qualities such as connection, genuine advocacy and therapeutic-use-of-self have been undervalued and under-represented by the new education standards. Originality/value This paper calls on the profession and service users to join the discourse and inform future mental health nursing identity. Ultimately, this paper calls on the NMC to reconsider the underpinning principles of the education standards and allot due consideration to the specific needs of the mental health nursing profession.

Mental health deserves better: Resisting the dilution of specialist pre‐registration mental health nurse education in the United Kingdom

“…Acknowledging that improving physical health outcomes, specifically for mental health service users who are disproportionately disadvantaged compared to the rest of the population, should be a priority, it should not be to the detriment of mental health care. Connell et al (2022) argue that though underpinned by, or perhaps veiled by, noble aims to improve physical health outcomes of a nation (Willis, 2012(Willis, , 2015, reducing nursing to a generic nursing programme is somewhat erroneous. Connell et al (2022) argue that mental health nursing is engaged in a war of attrition.…”

Towards a new (or rearticulated) philosophy of mental health nursing: A dialogue‐on‐dialogue

“…Our collaborative enquiry takes place in the context of recent calls to attend to the identity of the mental health nurse (see, e.g., Connell et al, 2022; Hurley & Lakeman, 2021; McKenna Lawson, 2022) and the foundational role that philosophy could or should play in foregrounding this identity. In the spirit of continuing to build ‘rhizomatic’, ‘tentacular’ dialogue within the nursing community, our aim is to invite discussion—to raise up the issue—rather than provide straightforward answers (Haraway, 2016; Hopkins‐Walsh et al, 2022).…”

Associated factors of nurse‐sensitive patient outcomes: A multicentred cross‐sectional study in psychiatric inpatient hospitals

“…Robust evidence on how associations, such as relational‐contextual factors and patient characteristics, influence nurse‐sensitive patient outcomes of the nurse–patient relationship is limited (Burr et al, 2017; Desmet et al, 2021; Kynoch et al, 2022, Prentice et al, 2021). This lack of evidence is a barrier on improving the quality of the nurse–patient relationship in clinical mental health nursing practice and in nursing education (Connell et al, 2022; Coster et al, 2018; González‐Blanch et al, 2021; Moorhead et al, 2018). The lack of evidence is also a threat to guiding clinical‐shared decision‐making, supporting directions in nursing education to improve the therapeutic alliance, improving quality assessment of the nurse–patient relationship, identifying important directions for research (Bladon, 2018; Coster et al, 2018; Desmet et al, 2023; de Bienassis et al, 2022; Lorien et al, 2020).…”