# mental health nursing in australia!!



## tristan23 (May 10, 2009)

Due to start work at a melbourne mental health hospital and just wondering what are the major differences that some nursess have found in comparison to UK mental health nursing or maybe just advice they could give to someone starting out in australia ??


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## traceymac (Jul 19, 2009)

hi there! do you know which hospital you will be working in yet? i am also a mental health nurse, came over at the end of december. my experience is in adult acute. they use seclusion rooms here a lot and restraints, whereas in scotland we rely on constant and special obs more. they only employ qualified nurses on the ward, no nursing assistants. they push to discharge at least two patients a day, which means people get discharged much sooner than they would in scotland. they use olanzapine/zyprexa prn A LOT. they also use ECT a heck of a lot for psychotic patients.

umm, the communication isnt great on the ward im in. dont get me wrong a lot of the nurses are fantastic, but the ones in charge do not keep you updated in changes to your patients. they dont use the NAMED NURSE/ASSOCIATE NURSE scheme here, aparently they tried it before and failed (dont know how it failed?!?!) so you get allocated different patients every shift and theres no continuity of care. and the just half one ward round a week, where all the doctors go and discuss theyre patients, with social work and the nurse in charge etc. in scotland each consultant has a different day of the week they see their patients. and if you dont do it already they train all the nurses to take blood.

hope this helps, if you want to know anything else just ask. oh and of course these are just my own personal experiences so far, other peoples will differ. and most importantly the pay is much better here.


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## tristan23 (May 10, 2009)

i am due to start work at the maroondah hospital which is under eastern health . i just posted this thread out of interest as even though i am a trained mental health nurse i have been working in a medium forensic ward for adolescents and just wondered how different things are there. my friend moved to perth a year ago and she tells me that the nursing is bit backward and not on the same level of nursing as the uk but she however says life in aussie is less stressful for her. i dont know what you think being there .... where are you based are you in melbourne or elsewhere??I am not trained to take blood but however open to any new learning g experiences . Do they a have the mental health act or something similar ??





traceymac said:


> hi there! do you know which hospital you will be working in yet? i am also a mental health nurse, came over at the end of december. my experience is in adult acute. they use seclusion rooms here a lot and restraints, whereas in scotland we rely on constant and special obs more. they only employ qualified nurses on the ward, no nursing assistants. they push to discharge at least two patients a day, which means people get discharged much sooner than they would in scotland. they use olanzapine/zyprexa prn A LOT. they also use ECT a heck of a lot for psychotic patients.
> 
> umm, the communication isnt great on the ward im in. dont get me wrong a lot of the nurses are fantastic, but the ones in charge do not keep you updated in changes to your patients. they dont use the NAMED NURSE/ASSOCIATE NURSE scheme here, aparently they tried it before and failed (dont know how it failed?!?!) so you get allocated different patients every shift and theres no continuity of care. and the just half one ward round a week, where all the doctors go and discuss theyre patients, with social work and the nurse in charge etc. in scotland each consultant has a different day of the week they see their patients. and if you dont do it already they train all the nurses to take blood.
> 
> hope this helps, if you want to know anything else just ask. oh and of course these are just my own personal experiences so far, other peoples will differ. and most importantly the pay is much better here.


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## tristan23 (May 10, 2009)

Thank you for your post it has been most helpful


tristan23 said:


> i am due to start work at the maroondah hospital which is under eastern health . i just posted this thread out of interest as even though i am a trained mental health nurse i have been working in a medium forensic ward for adolescents and just wondered how different things are there. my friend moved to perth a year ago and she tells me that the nursing is bit backward and not on the same level of nursing as the uk but she however says life in aussie is less stressful for her. i dont know what you think being there .... where are you based are you in melbourne or elsewhere??I am not trained to take blood but however open to any new learning g experiences . Do they a have the mental health act or something similar ??


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## hjc123 (Oct 14, 2015)

Hello All,
I am a student mental health nurse in the UK looking to emigrate back to Oz when I graduate (I lived there before).
I have the opportunity to apply for an elective placement in Perth and need to state a clear rationale for going. I want to explore the differences in general vs specialised trained mental health nurses. I've been told my the link lecturer at uni that there are a lot of British expat nurses working in the hospital, so I need to consider how they work together with the Aussie nurses.

Does anyone have any personal experience of this? How did you find it? Does anyone know where I can find research on differently trained nurses working together - I'm having trouble finding much!

Thanks,
Hayley.


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## dannyduke (Sep 19, 2015)

hjc123 said:


> Hello All,
> I am a student mental health nurse in the UK looking to emigrate back to Oz when I graduate (I lived there before).
> I have the opportunity to apply for an elective placement in Perth and need to state a clear rationale for going. I want to explore the differences in general vs specialised trained mental health nurses. I've been told my the link lecturer at uni that there are a lot of British expat nurses working in the hospital, so I need to consider how they work together with the Aussie nurses.
> 
> ...


For best chance of getting a job in AU I think you better get a PR visa first. I guess you are still young and under 25 years old after you graduate, then you can try to take PTE or IELTS and score 79+ each skills for PTE or 8.0 for IELTS to claim enough 60 points. For nurses, 60 is enough to get an invitation as the quota for nurses is very high.


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