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Mental Health Nurses (RMNs)
Working life
For some people, mental illness can be triggered by an event such as divorce, the death of someone close, birth, alcohol and drug abuse or changes in personal circumstances, including at work.
Roles and Duties
Your role is to build effective relationships with people who use your services, and also with their relatives and carers. You might help one person to take their medication correctly while advising another about relevant therapies or social activities.
Success comes from being able to establish trusting relationships quickly, to help individuals understand their situation and get the best possible outcome. You will be trained about the legal context of your work and also be able to identify whether and when someone may be at risk of harming themselves or someone else.
Helping people back to mental health is every bit as valuable and satisfying as caring for those with a physical illness.
Where will you work?
Mental health nurses are usually based in hospitals or in the community, as this is where the majority of mental healthcare is offered. If you work in a residential setting, you may do shifts and provide 24-hour care.
You would work as part of a team which includes general practitioners, psychologists, social workers, psychiatrists, occupational therapists, arts therapists and healthcare assistants.
Within a hospital you might work in a:
- psychiatric intensive care unit
- psychiatric ward
- outpatients unit
- specialist unit dealing with eating disorders.
In the community you could work at a:
- GP surgery
- prison
- community health care centre
- residential centre
- patients’ own homes.