Centre for Psychiatric Nursing, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
School of Management, RMIT, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
Int J Ment Health Nurs. 2021 Oct;30 Suppl 1:1445-1455. doi: 10.1111/inm.12898. Epub 2021 Jun 17.
The lived experience workforce has moved from being a grassroots support and activist movement to become the fastest growing workforce within mental health. As lived experience work becomes assimilated within mainstream mental health service delivery, it faces mounting pressure to become more professionalized. Professionalization has evoked both optimism and fear, with diverging views within the lived experience workforce. In this paper, an assessment of the existing professionalization of the lived experience workforce is undertaken by drawing on theoretical positions and indices of what constitutes a profession. The arguments for and against professionalization are explored to identify the risks, benefits, and considerations for the lived experience workforce. The drive for professionalization has largely occurred due to the clinically focused mental health systems' valuing of professional identity. The argument in favour of professionalization is motivated by a need for credibility within the views of that system, as well as greater regulation of the workforce. However, tensions are acknowledged with concerns that professionalization to appeal to the clinically focused system may lead to erosion of the values and uniqueness of lived experience work and nullify its effectiveness as an alternative and complementary role. Given mental health nurses are increasingly colleagues and often line managers of lived experience workers, it is important at this stage of lived experience workforce development that mental health nurses understand and are able to advocate for lived experience roles as a distinct professional discipline to help avoid the risks of co-option to more dominant clinical practice.
从基层支持和激进运动开始，具有生活体验的人员逐渐成为精神健康领域发展最快的劳动力。随着生活体验工作逐渐融入主流精神健康服务提供体系，它面临着越来越大的专业化压力。专业化既引发了乐观情绪，也引发了恐惧情绪，在生活体验工作者中存在不同的观点。本文通过借鉴构成专业的理论立场和指标，对生活体验工作者的现有专业化程度进行评估。探讨了专业化的利弊，以确定生活体验工作者的风险、收益和考虑因素。专业化的驱动力主要源于以临床为重点的精神健康系统对专业身份的重视。赞成专业化的观点是出于在该系统的观点中需要可信度，以及对劳动力的更大监管。然而，人们承认存在紧张局势，担心为了吸引以临床为重点的系统而专业化可能导致生活体验工作的价值观和独特性受到侵蚀，并使其作为替代和补充角色的有效性失效。鉴于精神健康护士越来越成为生活体验工作者的同事，并且通常是他们的直属上级，因此在生活体验工作者队伍发展的现阶段，精神健康护士理解并能够倡导将生活体验角色视为独特的专业学科非常重要，这有助于避免被更占主导地位的临床实践所同化的风险。
