Mental health nursing

Mental health nursing, also known in some jurisdictions as psychiatric nursing or psychiatric–mental health nursing, is a nursing specialty concerned with the care of people who are at risk of, or experiencing, mental health conditions, substance use disorders or related behavioural difficulties. It combines attention to physical and psychosocial health with therapeutic communication, environmental and social factors, and the person's own goals.

Mental health nurses work with people across the lifespan in hospitals, community services, primary care, residential services, schools, correctional settings and people's homes. Depending on their education and legal scope of practice, their work may include comprehensive assessment, nursing diagnosis and care planning, psychosocial interventions, medication administration and monitoring, physical health care, crisis intervention, suicide prevention, care coordination, health education and advocacy. The therapeutic relationship is a defining feature of the specialty, although it is one component of a wider clinical and public-health role.

Education, titles and authority vary substantially between countries. Some systems provide direct-entry undergraduate education in mental health nursing; others prepare a general registered nurse who later specializes. Advanced-practice mental health nurses may assess and diagnose mental disorders, provide psychotherapy and prescribe medicines where local law authorizes them to do so.