What Are the Essential Personal Qualities Required for Success in Mental Nursing?

success in mental nursing " calls for discussion and definition before the personal qualities of the nurse can be considered. What then is meant by success in mental nursing ? Is it rapid promotion from student nurse to matron or chief male nurse ? No, for this may be the fruit of skilful Place-seeking rather than good nursing. Is the achievement of brilliant recoveries, especially when the prognosis js unfavourable, to be regarded as success ? No, brilliance rather for the psychiatrist and the research specialist than for the nurse. Again, is the avoidance of accidents, of untoward incidents, and the prevention of sickness by vigilance and foresight to be regarded as the criterion ?f success ? Not entirely, for, commendable as these may be, successful mental nursing is more than this. There are many more pointers to success and fields which the nurse must succeed. There is the nurse ?f whom every patient speaks well and whom the visitors Praise, but popularity is not the only hall mark of sound w?rk. Another may have the gift of being able to Manage a difficult case, but this is success in one field only. Is good administration, cleanliness and order, a quiet ward and disciplined patients the standard of efficiency ? Surely not, for these attributes alone do not necessarily mean happiness and well being. The ability induce patients to employ themselves usefully, to benefit from occupational therapy and thus assist their ?wn recovery is but one form of treatment. Remembering that sick nursing is an important part 01 mental nursing, a good nurse can help to ease suffering and prolong life when one less skilled may have let tie patient slip beyond human help. He should prevent soreness and complete degeneration in the case of a erminal dementia or dementia paralytica. He may have nursed the patient through a severe illness and back to good physical health. A potential suicide has perhaps een treated for some self-inflicted injury and then j^'Ped back on to the road to complete physical and Rental recovery. The mental illness is sometimes ssociated with some physical disorder which, if carefully Ul?ed and treated in co-operation with the medical sl^n 'eac* to cornP'ete relief. Technical nursing tL11 under medical direction in the use of insulin shock yerapy, prolonged narcosis, induced hyper pyrexia, ectro convulsant therapy or post-operative care in Pre-frontal leucotomy, or participation in some other ?rm of modern mental treatment may be contributory 0 the success of the medical staff. Important as these Accesses may be, they are still only one aspect of success'menta, nursing. of. .Ur objective cannot be limited to any one field or set 1 C|rcumstances. No one method or group of results, ven the recovery of some patients, can be rightly described s complete success. Indeed a 100 per cent, success may never be apparent, for the achievement of alleviation of the severity of the illness or the remission of the signs and symptoms must be regarded as good and successful nur^pg. This achievement is a multiple one which includes all the partial and individual successes