Re: Psychiatric Nurses-- Scope of Practice?
The "official" scope of practice, according to the professional organizations and ethics standards within nursing, is that generalist RNs (undergrad-prepared, basic licensure) are not prepared/qualified to do psychotherapy -- RNs can do psychoeducational groups (coping skills, anger management, med education, etc., etc.) but not process groups or individual psychotherapy. Individual and group psychotherapy is within the scope of practice for psych CNSs and NPs, who are educated in this (at least minimally) as part of their graduate education (before prescriptive authority became such a big trend, psych CNS education consisted almost entirely of training as a psychotherapist. Now, most programs are focused on physical assessment, pharmacology, and medication management, with a little psychotherapy thrown in on the side).
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I would definitely be looking at psych NP anyway, and I definitely do have a certain amount of psychotherapy training and experience as an MSW. (MSW's can do different types of therapy under the supervision of LCSW's, and then they can provide any type of therapy as LCSW's-- but they have to do 2-3 years of supervised work under an LCSW before they can become licensed, and the real catch is it has to be a very specific kind of job which is just about impossible to get right now.) Mostly, I was wondering if the jobs available for a psych NP would include being able to provide therapy, particularly for groups.
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