Opening the black-box of person-centred care: An arts-informed narrative inquiry into mental health education and practice.
BACKGROUND
Nursing education has a history of encouraging students to know their patients and to negotiate the in-between of art/science, person/profession, and intuition/evidence. Nurse-teachers know that students may abandon some values and practices when they encounter practice environments that are complex and have competing agendas. We are concerned that nursing knowledge is black-boxed, invisible and taken-for-granted, in healthcare settings.


OBJECTIVE
Our research explores how nursing students and nurses are constructing and enacting person-centred care in mental health education and practice. We want to understand the nursing standpoint on this significant ontological issue and to make nursing knowledge construction and utilization visible; illuminating how person-centred theory emerges from practice.


METHODS
The process involved four 3-hour group meetings and an individual follow-up telephone conversation.


METHODS
Students and nurses met at a tertiary-care mental health organization.


METHODS
Fourteen nurses (Registered Nurses and Registered Practical Nurses) and nursing students (Bachelor of Science in Nursing and Practical Nursing) participated in our inquiry.


METHODS
We used arts-informed narrative inquiry to explore experience through the arts such as metaphor, collage, poems, letters, and group conversations.


RESULTS
The black-box is opened as the inquiry reveals how nursing knowledge is constructed, assumptions are challenged and new practices emerge.


CONCLUSIONS
Our research is significant for education and for practice and is transferable to other populations and settings. Nurses are affirmed in person-centred values and practices that include partnership with those in their care, role modeling for colleagues and mentoring students and new nurses. Students participate in transferring their learning from school to practice, in the company of experienced colleagues; together they open the black-box to show how nurses conceptualize and enact person-centred care.
Daphne Cockwell School of Nursing, Ryerson University, Canada. Electronic address: jschwind@ryerson.ca.
Jasna K
JK
Schwind
Faculty of Health Sciences, UA3055, University of Ontario Institute of Technology, Canada. Electronic address: gail.lindsay@uoit.ca.
Gail M
GM
Lindsay
Faculty of Health Sciences, UA 30XX, University of Ontario Institute of Technology, 2000 Simcoe Street North, Oshawa, ON L1H 7K4, Canada. Electronic address: sue.coffey@uoit.ca.
Sue
S
Coffey
School of Health and Community Services, Durham College, 2000 Simcoe Street North, Oshawa, ON L1H 7K4, Canada. Electronic address: Debbie.morrison@durhamcollege.ca.
Debbie
D
Morrison
Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences, 700 Gordon Street, Whitby, ON L1N 5S9, Canada. Electronic address: mildonb@ontarioshores.ca.
Barb
B
Mildon
D004506:Education, Nursing; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008603:Mental Health / Q000193:education*; D017145:Models, Educational; D033262:Narration; D024802:Nurse's Role / Q000523:psychology; D018802:Patient-Centered Care; D036301:Qualitative Research; D013338:Students, Nursing / Q000523:psychology
Arts-informed narrative inquiry; Experience; Person-centred care; Practice-based theory; Praxis