Practice Leadership in Mental Health and Intellectual Disability Nursing

Mark Jukes has been in Learning Disabilities as a practicing nurse, educator and academic for thirty years. In that time he has also qualified in mental health nursing and has worked specifically within acute mental health services as well as developing community learning disability services across the south west of England. He has been a Senior Nurse and Nurse Advisor to a Health Trust in the South West of England and acted as a consultant to other services with regard to both service provision and nursing practice. For the past twenty years he has been involved in nurse education at pre and post registration level, and advised nurses in the West Midlands on practice development, as well as contributing to specialist and advanced practice nursing programmes within Birmingham City University.

This text gives a succinct account on where leadership is to be focused in such a transitional sea of policy and ideological shifts never before witnessed to such a radical degree of implementation. Both mental health and learning disability nurses are being challenged in terms of where they appear to be best placed. A raft of policies has resulted in nurses addressing and collaborating with a new host of commissioning bodies and having to respond to "vulnerability" within an increasing hostile society, and where social exclusion is being overtly presented in a variety of environments and situations. The book focuses on primary, secondary and tertiary concerns and challenges as they impact upon people with mental health needs and learning disabilities, and chapters will be written by experienced practitioners and academics across both fields where the intention will be to emphasise the need for not only clear clinical leadership but also the call for further integration and collaboration across services.