DN453 Mental Health Nursing (NSS8)
School:
Nursing,Midwifery & Health Sys If you are interested in a rewarding, exciting and challenging career in healthcare, then nursing is for you.
If you are interested in a rewarding, exciting and challenging career in healthcare, then nursing is for you.
As a registered nurse, you have a wide range of clinical career options open to you, and with your academic and professional qualifications, you can choose to travel anywhere in the world. A degree in nursing provides you with the expert knowledge and clinical skills needed to care for people in a wide range of healthcare settings.
A nursing degree is a professional degree that allows the graduate to apply for registration as a nurse with the professional regulatory authority for nursing in Ireland, An Bord Altranais. A degree in Nursing at UCD is a four-year (or four-and-a-half-year for DN116 and DN117) honours degree that aims to develop knowledgeable, competent and caring professionals, by combining theoretical and clinical elements.
Students taking a degree in nursing pursue one of three modes of study as follows:
- BSc (Nursing) General Nursing (4 years) DN110/DN111
- BSc (Nursing) Psychiatric Nursing (4 years) DN120/DN121
- BSc (Nursing) Children's and General Nursing (Integrated) (4.5 years) DN116/DN117
Students interested in taking the General Nursing (DN110/DN111) or Children's and General (Integrated) Nursing (DN116/DN117) options will experience a variety of care settings, including acute medical and surgical, accident & emergency, operating theatre, intensive care, maternity and childcare, care of older persons, children's nursing and community care.
Students hoping to take the Psychiatric Nursing option (DN120/DN121) are placed in care settings such as acute assessment and admission, weight restoration programmes, addiction services, forensic services, child and adolescent services, intellectual disability services and community care.
Each nursing mode is pre-chosen through the CAO system and the programme content varies according to the mode being followed. However, all degree students follow a number of common modules in both the life and human sciences.
Examples of subjects studied in the life sciences include:
- Physics
- Chemistry
- Biochemistry
- Pharmacology
- Microbiology
- Structure & function of the human body
Examples of subjects studied in the human sciences include:
- Psychology
- Sociology
- Health & social policy
- Ethics
Core modules covered on the General Nursing option in particular include: Clinical Placement Operating Theatre and Clinical Placement High Dependency in Stage 2; Clinical Placement Maternity Care and Clinical Placement Out-patient Department in Stage 3; and Social Science for Healthcare in Stage 4.
Some core modules specific to the Psychiatric Nursing programme include: Foundations in Mental Health in Stage 1; Clinical Placement Addiction Services and Pharmacology & Pathology in Stage 2; Acute Mental Illness and Therapeutic Interventions in Stage 3; and Management & Quality Improvement and Health & Social Policy in Stage 4.
Core modules expressly found on the Children's & General Nursing programme include: The Child in Health & Wellness and Child & Family Centred Nursing in Stage 2; Child and Adolescent Special Healthcare Needs in Stage 3; Bioscience Applied to Nursing in Stage 4; and Clinical Placement Children's & General in the final stage.
The degree programmes emphasise the development of knowledge for clinical practice - the science of nursing science - and the development of a range of competencies needed for professional practice as a registered nurse. All three nursing degree programmes incorporate periods of theoretical and clinical instruction at each of the four/four-and-a-half stages and include a period of internship in clinical practice under the supervision of registered nurses as a member of the care team in the final year, for which you are paid a salary.
Depending on your chosen mode of study, you will undertake a range of theoretical and clinical modules that are designed to meet the professional requirements for registration in the particular division of the Register of Nurses.
You will study in state-of-the-art facilities in Ireland at the UCD School of Nursing, Midwifery & Health Systems building, located at the university's Health Sciences Centre. You will take your clinical placements within the School's partner university hospitals and in other healthcare institutions and settings.
Through the international student exchange programme, there are opportunities for you to travel abroad while studying.
The UCD School of Nursing, Midwifery & Health Systems has a student exchange arrangement with the University of Lund in Sweden, University of Athens, University of Malta and the School also hosts Junior Year Abroad students from a number of universities in the USA.
A degree in nursing is a passport to a rewarding and challenging career. Opportunities within Ireland are excellent with a wide variety of health service providers offering positions for registered nurses.
There are also numerous opportunities for specialisation in any one of a large number of fields of nursing and healthcare. The nurse in the modern health services has excellent career prospects and has a wide range of opportunities for career advancement beyond initial registration. A graduate of nursing or midwifery from UCD has the ability to travel throughout Europe, the Middle East, the USA, Canada, Australia and beyond.
DN007 Social Science
DN002 Medicine
DN118/DN119 Midwifery
DN008 Science
