09/06/2012

The clinical practice of psychiatric nursing can occur within an inpatient or outpatient setting. Registered nurses work with individuals, families, groups, and communities; assessing mental health needs, developing diagnoses, plan, implement, and evaluate nursing care. They deal with nursing practices characterized by interventions that promote and foster health, assess dysfunction, assist clients to regain or improve their coping abilities, and prevent further disability. These interventions focus on psychiatric-mental health clients and include health promotion, preventative management, assisting client with self-care activities, administering and monitoring treatment regimens, health education including but not limited to psychoeducation crisis intervention, counseling and case management.
This specialty of nursing is one that cares for people of all ages with mental illness or mental distress, such as; Schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, psychosis, depression, and dementia. In the inpatient setting, the patient population mainly consists of those patients who will benefit more from a structured, safe, and supervised environment with a direct care approach. The RN’s in the inpatient setting are not only involved in care planning, scheduling, and charting, they are constantly supervising, dealing with medication administration, and performing health checks. Outpatient services are provided to those individuals who may be better served by remaining in their home environment while utilizing services through community centers that are extensions of the hospital. Partial Hospital Programs are another level of care that allows you to be at home in the evening yet offer intensive day programming as a step-down from inpatient treatment or a step-up from outpatient services. Outpatient RN’s have the role that consists mainly of care planning, scheduling