To be annoyed Mental Health Nursing ‘isn’t real nursing’

[Happymedium31]

I work in an impatient Mental health unit for the NHS (PICU). Picked a prescription up from our local pharmacy and the conversation turned to Covid-19. The member of staff basically joked saying we couldn’t class ourselves as frontline workers as we were Mental Health and it’s not real nursing.
I had to bite my tongue while keeping confidentiality (1 confirmed case on our unit and 1 confirmed case on the Acute unit that’s on the same site) and told her we had exactly the same difficulties as a General hospital ie shortage of PPE, extremely vulnerable patients, staff shortages due to staff self isolating etc.
She basically brushed it off as if I was stupid.
Is this the opinion of the British public?
We are Nurses too, just in a different field, facing the exact same impossibilities and quite frankly broken.
Am I AIBU to be livid?

I could never in a million years work in mental health. Nothing but respect for you. I have sadly always struggled with patients with mental health and neuro issues causing behavioral problems. I started my career in neurosurgery and hated every second.

I know that sounds truly awful of me and I agree. I believe it to be the hardest kind of nursing by far and I'm currently a nurse practitioner working in A&E and ICU in the midst of Corona world.

Hi if your area isn’t taking admissions what’s happening to the patients in the community.

Ex RMN here ..left too long ago to fast track back in but looking to get back as an HCA if possible...as an RMN in an old large hospitals we did pretty much everything especially on the geriatric wards..my first shifts were on 25 -30 bed wards with doubly incontinent dementing men and women, we did dressings , washing , assessed pain management if possible , assessed cognitive ability and picked up poo ...now thats what i call nursing! 😁😷

I'd have just told her that she is a failed doctor and walked out, then reporting her. Deserves rudeness for being so stupid.

Complete nonsense she is talking.

Bloody hell, you are very much valued, you deal with the unseen illness. Thank you for all you do

People can be funny.

I work in a school in a professional, but non teaching role. People judge based on the very small amount they know about the role, and sadly, people like to feel superior.

Rise above. You know what you do, and that you make a difference.

The pharmacy person is
an idiot. You and your colleagues are essential to the health of the nation. I know whose side I am on. Stay well

I'm not a nurse but I would imagine mental health nursing is a bloody hard job!

I’m currently going through a mental health crisis (not related to COVID) Mental Health Nurses do an invaluable job in an overstretched part of the sector , I’m only not seeking help because I know many are being deployed to help in the front lines....at the same time, it’s one of the reasons I’m not harming myself - don’t want to be a burden on current resources.

You know your worth OP, through your work you have probably saved more lives than the person at the pharmacy.

Mental health care is really, really struggling at the moment. I'm a CPN in a referrals and assessment team (so assess new referrals and signpost to more appropriate teams) and we can offer very, very little ATM. All OP clinics will be closing....I'm really just 'mopping up' my case load by doing telephone assessments. We can't refer on for psychotherapy or offer any routine appointments with a psychiatrist at the moment. I'm phoning clients and I can tell their really struggling because coronavirus is adding additional strain due to job and financial insecutity and being stuck indoors with the kids off school. All I can offer them at the moment is a crisis line. Inpatient units are discharging as many as possible, but our Home Treatment Team can't properly follow them up due to guidleilines and staff shortages. The ones left on the wards will be the most disturbed, many under section. I'm likely to be redeployed to either HTT, the wards or the depot clinic. I haven't worked on the wards for nearly 20 years!

I'm really worried, I think there will be a lot of suicides as a result of this.

What do Mental health Nurses do? Do you provide talking therapy?

The pharmacist was a prat!

When I was a mental health ,nurse Ocean,s I worked in both acute mental.health and elderly different times in inpatient care , on acute wards nurses will be making mental health assessments of patients ,talking to them to assess how they are assessing it they are eating ,sleeping, interactions with others ,doing medication rounds, liasing with other professionals ,ie OT,s Medical staff ,doing ward rounds ,speaking with relatives ,completing admissions endless paperwork ,which include risk assessments ,care plans etc and loads more When I worked in elderly care it was on a,long term Dementia ward it was very different but equally exhausting Medication rounds could take hrs , it involved a,lot of physical work such as full personal care ,feeding patients ,taking them to the toilet ,there was still lots of paper work but the risks were very different .

I had to explain to a family member that people with a mental health diagnosis can still get physically unwell. Psychosis doesn’t protect you.
‘Sorry love, I’ll help with your intrusive thoughts but your on your own with your respiratory illness’. Eh

As a Nurse I have so much admiration for mental health nurses. In my last job, the amount of under 18 having to be seen by Cahms when they attended A and E was so high. Cahms staff were fantastic, so short staffed. Having to undertake the risk assessments on these young people was very highly skilled work.

@Yogawoogie totally!

Unfortunately many people don't classify mental illness as being as serious as physical illness, therefore "logically" (to them) healthcare professionals in that field are not as important as "proper" (to them) nurses.

I am surprised - disappointed - that someone working in a pharmacy would hold these outdated and frankly idiotic ideas.

People are realising, slowly, that mental health needs to be treated as equally important as physical health - but for the time being all you can do is politely confront these people, one idiot at a time.

Older Adult CPN here and whilst now we're mostly confined to telephone appointments I have at least 2 patients I am having to see daily to administer medications and personal care because the district nurses are rushed off their feet and there aren't enough carers to go round.

As well as that the team are picking up prescriptions and food shopping to deliver to the doorstep of our most vulnerable patients.

I go home at night hoping that a certain percentage of my patients will be ok until morning when I can contact them again - they just aren't coping with no day care or socialising.

Any pharmacy worker who thinks that we're not all frontline is speaking out of their hole.

I would’ve had a few things to say if another hcp had said that to me. I’m a paediatric nurse and the number of people inc other nurses who say aww that must be nice playing with kiddies all day or what a fun job...and other comments about how we aren’t ‘proper’ nurses etc i have huge respect for all other nurses and health care professionals, I couldn’t do their jobs and I wouldn’t comment about them but also don’t expect them to comment on mine when they clearly haven’t got a clue.
Hope work is keeping you safe op and ignore the stupid comments just sad when they come from another hcp who should know better!!

@x2boys Thank you - that is a huge and varied amount of work!

Does anyone know if RMN are being redeployed? My mum is an RMN working in the mental health wards, and I'm worried about her, she is 69 still working PT and not in the best of health although she doesn't have any of the conditions in the vulnerable group list. She wants to keep working but is also very worried about her health.

Of course you are a proper nurse. As others have said it is an incredibly difficult job.
I have signed up to the goodsam page but I would really like to help on MH wards- is there any way I can volunteer to do this? No qualifications but 'lived' experience

It’s the same in maternity. Pregnant women get Coronavirus too, and we still have to provide care during pregnancy/ birth/ post natal.
As a midwife I’ve had it said that I’m lucky not to be exposed. I wish that was the reality!! All nhs staff regardless of role are in this fight together. X

People are ignorant, I ignore them!

I'm an RMN working on an older peoples acute admissions ward. We are battling so hard to keep Covid 19 off the wards as we have extremely vulnerable patients. It is very tough; still open to admissions and there is a lot of pressure to take admissions regardless of the Covid 19 screening picture. It's a lot of responsibility on one nurses shoulders as we will likely have seriously ill patients if we get it on the ward.

It's a horrible time for all nurses💐

Do you mean to.other areas of the NHS Yang?I'm not sure how that would be logistically possible ,when I was an RMN I was employed by a mental health trust and whilst my contract stipulated I could be moved to anywhere within the trust i. obviously couldn't be moved to a Medical ward or whatever as i was,nt employed by them ,also.I'm not sure how useful I would have been to general ward ,as I did very little general nurse p!acements during my training which was over 20 years ,but as for wether RMN,s can be redeployed within their trust than yes quite possibly

Of course you are a real nurse. You and your colleagues are amazing. I work in mental health and the things you nurses do are just incredible.