More and Better Psychiatric Nursing

Abstract

WE hear so much today about the overproduction of nurses, the unemployment of nurses, and the poorly trained nurse. The Grading Committee's report and Dr. Horner's recent report of conditions in New York State' have proven that these things are true. A very large per cent of nurses who have been graduated from the schools of nursing have not been given adequate training to fit them for any special type of nursing work. There is an overproduction of nurses, due mainly to the fact that hospitals conducting schools of nursing have done so chiefly for the purpose of giving patients some form of nursing care, and have not taken into consideration the education of the nurse. Therefore, we have a very large number of poorly trained nurses who are unemployed. Another factor in the increase of applicants to our school is, that many young women, who might formerly have gone into other professions, have entered schools of nursing, where they are able to obtain an education with special training at very little expense to them. The Grading Committee has made an effort to analyze the situation and find a remedy for it. The suggestion is made that schools of nursing limit the number of admissions, or discontinue their schools and employ graduate nurses. We do not find that this is true of the conditions in our mental hospitals, as various reports show that 50 per cent of all hospital beds in the United States are filled by mental patients, with a very small number of registered nurses to care for them. The question has arisen as to the advisability of discontinuing the schools of nursing connected with mental hospitals and employing registered nurses and attendants. Dr. Horner's recent report of the conditions existing in the schools of nursing in New York, shows us that few graduate nurses have had training in the care of the mental patient. Therefore, would it be possible to find a sufficient number of registered nurses today who are qualified to come into mental hospitals and give the necessary nursing care to these patients? It seems imperative that we take larger groups in schools of nursing in mental hospitals or increase the number of affiliations with general hospitals and also offer postgraduate courses. If this can be done, in a few years we will have a sufficient number of nurses who will have better understanding of the needs of the patients and a clearer conception of mental hygiene nd psychiatry. Many graduates have not found the work in mental hospitals desirable. We should make the work attractive o they will wish to remain, not because they will be assured an income, but because they are interested in the atients and their needs. The student today appreciates the need of courses in psychology, mental hygiene, and psychiatry to enable her to meet the demands of her patients and to give intelligent nursing care. It has been most interesting to hear the comments made by students from general hospitals who have had an affiliation in a mental hospital. Many say that the course has not only given 1 Horner, Harland Hoyt: Nursing Education and Practice in New York State with Suggested Remedial Measures. University of the State of New York Press, Albany, 1934.