Are you a health professional working in a mental health setting with a desire to become an advanced clinical practitioner? This short course focuses on developing your knowledge and understanding of how to assess the physical health needs of your patient group. Youll explore the management of assessments and the referral process.

Course details

This stand-alone professional development course aims to develop your understanding of the physical health needs of patients in a mental health setting. Its ideal if youre an aspiring advanced clinical practitioner (ACP) working in mental health as the course has a clinical focus and offers the opportunity to develop skills required for this role.

Our experienced and knowledgeable team will support you to gain an understanding of the need for robust physical health assessments within your speciality, and the necessary skill set to manage these and the referral process, where appropriate. Youll explore the perception of people with mental health and learning disability needs and how you can improve their physical healthcare needs. The course will emphasise how a patients mental health may impact their physical health and focus on how you can assess patients to make an appropriate diagnosis. Well guide you as you learn about common assessment tools and models and the principles of health education and health promotion.

Well cover the management of physical health needs and the importance of robust consultation, decision making and therapy, including networking and referrals. This will be linked to relevant legal policy and ethical aspects specific to mental healthcare and relating to consent and mental capacity. Evidence-based practice and clinical governance will underpin the development of your knowledge and skills, and well emphasise the importance of professional accountability and responsibility.cWell also support you to learn how to develop services that consider the physical needs of the mental health population and gain knowledge of how to make recommendations for practice development. The module will be delivered in collaboration between the University of Bolton and expert clinical practitioners from practice. To benefit from studying this course, you should already a health professional with a basic understanding and some clinical experience of working within mental health.

Course Highlights:

• Our dedicated academic team brings extensive health and social care experience to the course content. Along with their passion for service excellence in mental health settings, theyre also currently engaged in highly relevant research, which means they can add valuable context and insight to your learning.
• The course is designed to provide the flexibility to fit in with busy home and working lives.
• As you study this course, well encourage you to develop the skills, values and behaviours so popular with employers. These include action planning, personal impact and confidence, self-awareness, social and ethical responsibility, problem-solving, initiative and communication skills.
• The course is part of a professional development framework, and you can use the credits youll gain by completing the course successfully towards the MSc Advanced Clinical Practice (Mental Health).