Specialties Psychiatric
Published Sep 2, 2006
You are reading page 3 of Psych RN's, being phased out???
cherrymary
21 Posts
You know, to me this sounds like something we talked about in a class I'm taking on the history of psychiatry, the idea that 50 years from now there will be no psychiatrists, only neurologists!! Just look at the trend: 70 years ago, mental health was about behavioral science and psychotherapy; now the approach is more biological, based on psychopharmacology. This goes along with the associated belief that most MH diseases have some kind of neurological basis that will be established in the future, even if we don't know what it is yet. Remember all the diseases that were once the domain of psychiatrists that were then found to have a physiological basis and began to be treated accordingly - syphilis is the big one, but also pellagra and, increasingly, Alzheimer's. So psych nurses might not be "phased out" necessarily, but their role is probably changing as our conceptions of mental health change. Do those of you who have been practicing for many years see this happen in your work?
I'm curious (because I'm really interested in psych nursing) - how much of your practice is devoted to psychotherapy and social/behavioral aspects of MH, and how much is pharmacology? Or does it depend on where you get your training?
sampaul1966
12 Posts
substance misuse services in the UK are generally staffed by mental health nurses & thats an area that certainly isn't diminishing in need.
Halinja, BSN, RN
453 Posts
I think that's true here in the US as well