Historical Development of Psychiatric Nursing

Nursing began to emerge as a profession in the nineteenth century. Linda Richards was the first American psychiatric nurse, and the first school for psychiatric nurses opened in 1882. It was not until the late 1930s that nursing education viewed the importance of psychiatric knowledge in general nursing care related to all illnesses. The National Mental Health Act of 1946 provided funds for nursing education. The Brown Report of 1948 recommended the elimination of basic schools of nursing in medical hospitals and in 1950 the National League for Nursing required that a school had to provide an experience in psychiatric nursing to be accredited.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, nurses were struggling to define their roles as psychiatric nurses. The issue of nurses conducting psychotherapy was controversial. A critical development within the profession occurred with the publication of Peplau’s book in 1952. In which she presented a theoretical framework for psychiatric nursing. Nursing was influenced by the development of somatic therapies in the mid-1930s, the concept of the therapeutic community in the 1953s, and effective psychiatric nursing had evolved into a role of clinical competence based on interpersonal techniques and the use of the nursing process. Consoling was a primary nursing function.

The community mental health centers of 1963 influenced the movement of the practice of psychiatric nursing into the community and the formation of multidisciplinary treatment teams.

Psychiatric nursing was defined as an interpersonal process that strives to promote and maintain behavior, which contributes to integrated functioning.