Patrick J. McCartan

When it was originally published in 1986, this book was one of the few to be written on social skills and mental health specifically for nurses. Yet it is nurses who are uniquely placed to improve the skills of those with mental illness since it is they who often have most contact with patients or clients. This book examines the place of social skills training in the practice of psychiatric nursing. It provides relevant background to the evidence for limited social skills in psychiatric patients and the expanding role of the nurse and considers more practical elements such as selection and assessment of patients for a programme, goal-setting, role play, feedback, and group versus individual approaches. The book also analyses relevant skills themselves, such as nonverbal communication and being assertive. The book is aimed at both trained and student psychiatric nurses.