Implementation and testing of the OPT Model as a teaching strategy in an undergraduate psychiatric nursing course.

Teaching undergraduate nursing students to think critically and reason clinically is a challenge for nurse educators, yet these skills are essential for the professional nurse. The Outcome-Present State-Test (OPT) Model of Reflective Clinical Reasoning (Pesut & Herman, 1999) provides a framework for teaching clinical reasoning skills to nursing students. This article describes how the model can be used in clinical teaching of undergraduate students in psychiatric and mental health settings and presents some findings from an evaluation of the model.

Nursing care of inpatients with borderline personality disorder.

Topic: This paper reviews the current literature on the nursing care of inpatients with borderline personality disorder (BPD). Information is included about the background and various features of BPD, and recent conceptualizations and predicted outcomes for BPD patients are provided. The effect of caring for patients with BPD on the nursing staff is discussed.

Clinical supervision of nurses working with patients with borderline personality disorder.

Some nurses describe individuals diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD) as among the most challenging and difficult patients encountered in their practice. As a result, the argument has been made for nursing staff to receive clinical supervision to enhance therapeutic effectiveness and treatment outcomes for individuals with BPD. Formal clinical supervision can focus on the stresses of working in a demanding environment within the work place and enable nurses to accept accountability for their own practice and development (Pesut & Herman, 1999).

Emotion processing in borderline personality disorders.

This study examined relationships between the ability to recognize facial affect and affective intensity in women with Borderline Personality Disorder. Women hospitalized with borderline personality disorder and community women without psychiatric disorder (n s = 35/group) were recruited via convenience sampling. The Pictures of Facial Affect and the Affect Intensity Measure were administered to consenting women.