What Is The Empowerment Model Of Mental Health Services?

A model to empower patients and their families in mental health care

thirty January, 2017

A new model of care for people with psychosis is currently being trialled in a number of countries. Called Open up Dialogue, it aims to empower patients and families

Citation: Martin F (2017) A model to empower patients and their families in mental health care. Nursing Times [online]; 113: two, 58.

Author:Fiona Martin is lecturer (educational activity), School of Nursing and Midwifery, Queen'due south University, Belfast.

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Introduction

There is a quiet revolution happening in mental health care, in particular in the response to the management of psychosis and crisis. Many patients and their families feel they are not being listened to or invited to be role of the decisions made about their intendance and treatment (Department of Health, 2015; Schizophrenia Committee, 2012). They are no longer content with the traditional system, in which the professional person is the sole skillful, as it fails to acknowledge the expertise of the patient and family.

Mental health services need a new approach that puts patients and their families/networks at its heart. Open Dialogue – a fairly new care model developed in Finland (opendialogueapproach.co.uk) – may offer a pregnant advance in addressing these issues and is being piloted in several countries including the United kingdom (Seikkula et al, 2015).

What is Open Dialogue?

The proper noun Open Dialogue was beginning used in Finnish Western Lapland in 1995. In the model, patients, their families/support networks and staff participate equally equals in all treatment meetings relating to the patient to generate, through dialogue, new and shared understandings of patients' personal experiences and the touch on of psychosis.

The model aims for continuity of care, and meeting preferably in the patient'south own home. This organisation increases a sense of psychological security for the patient and family unit, and allows for easier recognition of resources inside the family.

Travel scholarship

In 2015 I undertook a Florence Nightingale Travel Scholarship and visited Tornio, Republic of finland, the recognised habitation of Open Dialogue. The Open Dialogue literature described a positively evaluated model, in which patients and their families/support networks were at the heart of every decision made about them. I then spent a week in England at a residential Open Dialogue training event where four trusts are preparing to be part of the first multi-site Open Dialogue pilot in the United kingdom.

Later on the training event I visited the Us (Massachusetts, Vermont and New York), where Open Dialogue principles were beingness integrated into mental health systems. The Parachute Projection in New York City has attracted international involvement and country funding. It is the showtime time Open Dialogue has been used in a major urban environment.

Shared learning

In that location is an opportunity to incorporate Open Dialogue principles in the Britain. There should be greater awareness of the model equally information technology is however largely unknown, especially among mental health nurses. Information should exist disseminated to all stakeholders, patient and family/carer groups, and professional and community groups. In addition curricula design for pre- and post-registration nursing should consider including elements of Open Dialogue.

I would recommend that regions identify teams/services interested in piloting Open Dialogue in conjunction with higher education institutions and the international Open up Dialogue Network. Educating and training staff is critical and information technology is vital that a arrangement of evaluation is established for the pilot project.

The overall message from my visits is that patients and families are no longer content with the traditional organization, which includes a lack of recognition for their expertise. Open Dialogue attests to the importance of ensuring all voices are heard and responded to.

Implications for practice

Nurses demand to authentically respect patient and family unit expertise well-nigh their experiences of illness
The nurse-patient relationship, although central, should be seen within the context of the family/support network
Nurses must be supported to develop professional confidence in this shared decision-making model

This article reports on a travel scholarship provided past The Florence Nightingale Foundation. The scholarships give nurses and midwives an opportunity to study do elsewhere in the UK and/or overseas. They are awarded for the study of projects that will benefit both patients and the profession more widely in the U.k..

Department of Health (2015) No Voice Unheard, No Right Ignored: A Consultation for People with Learning Disabilities, Autism and Mental Health Conditions.

Schizophrenia Commission (2012) The Abandoned Affliction.

Seikkula J et al (2015) The comprehensive Open-Dialogue approach in Western Lapland: 11. Long-term stability of acute psychosis outcomes in advanced community care. Psychosis; 3: iii, 192-204.

2017-01-30