Implementation of Clinical Supervision: Educational preparation and subsequent diary accounts of the practicalities involved, from an Australian mental heath nursing innovation

Abstract

Accessible summary Clinical Supervision (CS) has shown promise as a positive contribution to the clinical governance agenda in health service provision. Educational preparation and first-hand testimony of the issues faced by mental health nursing staff engaged as supervisors in the implementation of CS arrangements in Queensland, Australia, are reported. Several challenges emerge from the diary accounts of their experience that may confront Clinical Supervision policy makers, educators, managers and clinicians, anywhere in the world, with immediate effect. Abstract Set against the backdrop of several inquiry reports about mental health service provision in Australia, the privately experienced cost of working and coping in contemporary mental health settings, remains poorly understood. Clinical Supervision, a structured staff support arrangement, has shown promise as a positive contribution to the clinical governance agenda and is now found reflected in central policy themes elsewhere in the world. However, the concept of Clinical Supervision remains underdeveloped in Australia. The background to a novel randomized controlled trial, currently in progress in Queensland, Australia, is reported elsewhere. This paper reports on the educational preparation for, and subsequent first-hand testimony of the issues faced by, front-line mental health nursing staff engaged in the implementation of Clinical Supervision, under the auspices of the randomized controlled trial. It is argued here that, in advance of quantitative findings becoming available, several challenges emerge from their supplementary and contemporaneous diary accounts of their experience that may confront Clinical Supervision policy makers, educators, managers and clinicians, anywhere in the world, with immediate effect. © 2009 Blackwell Publishing.