General

The NMC guidelines suggest that all nursing students should be given experiences in each of the other branches of nursing, ‘to inform branch choice’. There is a certain logic to this, in that it essentially allows you to ‘try before you buy’. Anyone coming from a care background is unlikely to have experienced all types of nursing, and anyone coming from college is basically just taking a guess as to which area they think they might like. So, before plunging into a seriously life changing decision, they very kindly let you have a quick go on the other branches.

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What with Azulinebloo soon to be qualified and unleashed upon the world, the powers that be have very kindly asked me to join and be the resident mental student. How could I refuse?

So, a bit about me for anyone who doesn’t already know…

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Kevin Myers, writing in the Irish Independent [1] [2] [3], has been threatened with prosecution for arguing that aid to Africa is doing more harm than good. He highlights the case of Ethiopia where he was a reporter during the famine of 1984 – 1985:

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Last night John Barrowman (Jack Harkness of Torchwood fame) presented a TV programme entitled “The making of Me” in which he went in search of why he is gay. Is it nature or was it Nurture?

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Book review

It is St Petersburg, 1914, and. Dr Otto Spethmann, a famous psychoanalyst, is implicated in the murder of a liberal newspaper editor OV Gulko. A few days later he and his daughter are arrested when a revolutionary dies under similarly mysterious circumstances but Spethman is preoccupied with Avrom Rozental, the brilliant chess master who is due to play the most important competition of his life but is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. With the city rife with speculation and alarm Spethmann broods over his own chessboard, its pieces frozen mid-battle, and contemplates the forces - political, historical, and sexual - that are holding him in their grasp.

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Do not panic! The upgrade is in process. Wordpress has been updated to the latest version. Most of the plugins look like they are working. Based on the five minutes of testing I have just done. Forums have been updated and should allow direct person to person messaging, any problems with this and it will be disabled.

The themes have been updated to the most recent versions which means the cruft I have added has been removed. When a favourite theme has been picked I will update the colours and tweak the appearance as currently they all look a bit garish on the eyes. For the love of Cthulhu do not just pick the plain unadorned Sandbox theme from the theme switcher.

Comments on themes, appearance, breaks and anything else technical and site related please leave a comment or discuss in the forums.

Thanks for your time and patience during this time of hideous ugliness.

Mental Nurse.

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I saw this website linked from another blog, but I can’t remember what one, so I apologise for no acknowledgement.

I wanted to share it even further and decided to post the link here as well.

Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life? Friends, meet Jon Arbuckle. Let’s laugh and learn with him on a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness in a quiet American suburb

Garfield is one of my favourite cartoon strips and I find this idea fascinating. It works so well, it’s often very moving.

Garfield Minus Garfield

Robin Lustig of Radio 4’s “World tonight” has written about the current financial crisis in his latest news letter. So if like me you are trying to sell a house and wondering why no one appears to want to buy it here’s why.

Maybe you care, maybe you don’t!

I have not disappeared / died / been sectioned, I am simply encountering technical difficulties. My computer won’t work.

 Fear not, for I shall return!

I read this here the other day. In it the author, Unity, takes Edward Leigh MP to task for his views on abortion and his links to a pro-life lobby in the House of Commons seeking to advance the case for increased restrictions on abortion. The piece is an intelligent one and well written and I would recommend the site, “Ministry of Truth” to anyone.

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Ok, that was a slight exaggeration, adding a bit of sensationalism, but the above point may come true in the future.

The NMC are currently running a review of pre-registration nursing education.

Questions include:

should nurses be prepared to diploma or degree level?

what proportion of a pre-registration programme should be spent learning in practice?

should shared learning be a requirement?

should there be generalist and/or branch programmes, and if so, what should the branches be?

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Last week or so I recall writing, along with others, about how people should take responsibility for their physical wellbeing to access healthcare.

I now realise that this was the real agenda for us staying fit and healthy.

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IMPORTANT NOTE - the letter that is between u and w in the alphabet doesn’t work on my keyboard! So it has been substituted for y. Why? Yes thats right, y. But why? Because it is physically similar to the untypable letter (etc…).

I don’t think I’m a real person you know. Maybe thats a bit harsh. Maybe I mean I’m just not a singular identity. More of a mishmash of ideas, thoughts, emotions, reflections and actions, that if you took a freeze frame shot of at any giyen time, would allegedly constitute a person.

But why the sudden existential malaise I hear you cry (in the barren wilderness)?

Because…

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Merry Christmas everyone!

Hopefully no one is reading this on the day itself. Just thought I would write a quick message to try and sum up the last year and some news on upcoming changes.

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I was flicking through this week’s Nursing Standard because….well, because the solitaire on my computer wasn’t working (stupid piece of shit magazine. Yes, Nursing Standard, we haven’t forgotten or forgiven your cover feature on the use of astrology in nursing…or the one on how to write doctor-and-nurse romance novels for Mills and Boon) and I came across a news snippet stating that a Christian university in Colorado has started offering nursing degrees that claim to blend nursing training with Christian values.

The course in question appears to be this one.

Nursing art and science at Colorado Christian University is grounded in physical science, liberal arts, and biblical principles. Each of these elements is foundational to the curricular building blocks in the education of nursing students. The curriculum emphasizes the health-illness continuum, care management, and restoration in order to support safe and effective nursing practice. The curricular framework cultivates professional development and nursing as ministry. The Bible and a personal faith in Jesus Christ empower students to interpret knowledge and practice the profession as a means of allowing faith to inform and shape the whole person and the practice of professional nursing. Faculty members facilitate the integration of faith, learning, and professional practice in order to prepare nurses to make a difference in the world.

It’s certainly been my experience (based on anecdotal impressions) that nursing seems to attract quite a few practising Christians. No real surprise, to be honest, given the vocational nature of the nursing profession. Mental, the founder and maintainer of this blog, is by his own description a member of the God Squad.

But an actual nursing degree that incorporates Christian theology? Good thing or bad thing?
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