Mental health nursing?

[YourSpleenIsDamp]

Is anyone here a mental health nurse? I'm thinking of retraining and wondered if you'd recommend it. What are the best bits? And the worst? Do you work in a hospital or in the community? I used to be a substance misuse worker with teenagers, and I've done some volunteering for Mind - is there anything else I could do to strengthen my application? Thanks!

Bump 🙂

Not a nurse, but as a random I would say I'm sure your experience would be very relevant and gladly received! And also, good for you! I often think it must be one of the most challenging jobs going. I don't know how you would go about researching, but try to choose a team which is really committed to improving things. I've sadly visited someone in lots of different hospitals over the years and the standards vary a lot, sadly.

I’m an RMN, worked in inpatient acute care for more than 20 years.

It’s a very tough career, best to specialise I think, forensic, early intervention teams or rehab, inpatient acute care is brutal and burnout rate is really high. Community teams have ludicrous caseloads due to inability to recruit.

You carry a lot of risk and the serious incidents can be difficult to move past.

Having said all of that, mental health nursing has been a solid career for me and I do love patient care.

You might find it helpful to do some bank HCA work in mental health, give you a real perspective on it.

We need new nurses coming through and you will never struggle for work!

Ooh - I hadn't thought of bank work, thanks!

Def get experience as a HCA/support worker. This will give you the insight to see if you really want to peruse the course. I’m not a RMN but work with a lot. High turnover of staff in some areas. It’s not an easy job!