nursing-meeting-2017-keynote

3 / 5

Volume 2, Issue 4 (Suppl) J Healthc Commun
ISSN: 2472-1654 JHC, an open access journal
July 31- August 01, 2017 Melbourne, Australia
International Meeting on
Nursing Research and Evidence Based Practice
Nursing Meeting 2017
July 31- August 01, 2017
Page 18
Notes:
Developing a tool to measure therapeutic engagement in mental health
nursing; the contribution of mental health service users
C urrent political and health care climates emphasize quality care standards and clinical
outcomes indicating the importance of using standardized measurement tools. To
contribute to these agenda it is important for Registered Mental Health Nurses (RMHNs)
to demonstrate their impact suggesting the need for a nursing metric. Fundamental
to mental health nursing and Service User (SU) recovery is Therapeutic Engagement
(TE) but difficulty exists when attempting to measure it. Arguments abound for and
against measuring TE not only in mental health nursing but generally in health care.
Such debates are not new and have existed from the time of Thorndike and Einstein; the
former stated “If anything exists, it exists in some amount; if it exists in some amount,
it can be measured and the latter not everything that counts can be counted and not
everything that can be counted counts. Notwithstanding the TE measurement debate,
it is imperative to have a metric that to demonstrates the value of mental health nursing
and its contribution to SU recovery. Rating scales measuring TE do exist, but none assess
TE in acute care settings to include both the general therapeutic environment and 1:1
interactions between SUs and RMHNs. Neither has any been developed in partnership
with SUs, nor developed to determine the impact of TE on the quality of SU experience/
recovery as perceived by them and RMHNs. To fill these gaps and also address the
question what is the contribution of mental health nursing to service user recovery, a
Therapeutic Engagement Questionnaire (TEQ) was developed. Using psychometric
principles a 20 item questionnaire was developed with 2 versions: One for SUs and one
for RMHNs. This paper explores political and professional considerations surrounding
the debate for developing and utilizing a psychometrically sound tool to produce a mental
health nursing metric. The development methodology and authentication process will be
described with supporting data, together with how it is being adopted in research and
practice locally, nationally and internationally.
Biography
Mary is Professor of Mental Health Nursing and Director of the Centre for Public Engagement, Faculty of Health,
Social Care and Education, Kingston University and St George's, University of London.
Throughout her career she has held a number of clinical, managerial and academic positions including coordinator
of the Northern Ireland Centre for Health Informatics. She is involved in a number of research projects locally
and internationally. She is a fellow of both the Royal Society of Medicine and the European Academy of Nurse
Scientists, and an expert panel member of HORATIO, the European Association for Psychiatric Nurses, and a
member of the Institute of Leadership and Management.
Mary has a well-established record of Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) in education and research dating
back to the 1980s. Outcomes of her work with respect to PPI in both these areas have had impact nationally and
internationally. Integral to this work has been the co-production and delivery of education programmes, as well as
PPI at all stages of the research process. PPI is one of her key research interests.
Mary Chambers
Kingston University and St George's,
University of London, UK
Mary Chambers, J Healthc Commun 2017, 2:4 (Suppl)
DOI: 10.4172/2472-1654-C1-001
Nursing Meeting 2017