Deborah Groves is the Director of Nursing for Monarch. I had the chance to meet Deborah at the 5th Annual NC Recovery One Community in Recovery Conference in Durham last year and she had spoken with me about her concerns (and these are concerns that I also share) for the recovery movement and for peers that we need to move more in the direction of integrated health and towards a more recovery-oriented system of care.
Deborah, how do you define success?
"I have a quote in my office that says 'Success is reaching beyond where you are.' This is an anonymous quote that has been on my desk for many years. To me, this is evidenced by learning something new every day and being challenged daily to expand my knowledge and skills as a nurse and mental health professional. I never want to get complacent with where I am in my professional life. A basic professional approach as a nurse is that we must be lifelong learners."
What are the changes that you are seeing take place in health care?
"Healthcare is in a constant state of change with new research, procedures, medications and interventions being developed and implemented every day. Success as a nursing professional for me is to meet the needs of my client, whoever that may be – an individual, a family, a group or a community. As health care needs evolve over time, it is my responsibility, as Director of Nursing, to ensure that the nursing staff for our agency meet the needs of the people being supported, and meet these needs with the highest quality of care possible."
What is a typical day and week for you?
"Each day and week for me is different, as things come up daily that need to be addressed through development of training programs, policies or procedures. I have nursing or administrative staff call me for consultation about clinical situations on a daily basis. I look at how we are providing nursing care within the agency, ensuring that we are in compliance with the Board of Nursing in terms of licensing scope of care for different levels of nursing staff. I also work to ensure compliance with accrediting bodies or the MCOs in terms of service definitions or outcome measures. This is one aspect of my job that I really enjoy, as it is challenging and different every day. A big part of this involves problem solving and creating approaches to address identified needs or problems. Through this process I am able to learn and grow every day."
What advice would you give to someone just entering the field?
"Be energetic and take every opportunity to learn from others – your supervisor, your peers, and the people you support. Volunteer for projects and view these as opportunities to learn and grow within your profession. Be willing to admit when you don’t know the answer – but then do the research to find the answer. There is a trend here – use every opportunity to learn and grow. That is how you keep your work life dynamic and interesting. Also important is to take care of the people you work with as you would like others to treat your mother, and you won’t go wrong. This keeps things in perspective for us and keeps us working for the individual who needs our help."
Deborah...What are your concerns for integrated health and whole health?
"I think it is wonderful that the healthcare world, and especially mental health care, is realizing that we need to treat the whole person. This has always been an important component in nursing care, so I’m excited that others are joining us in this approach. A person is a whole being – not just mental health care needs or just physical care needs. People come as a complete person, with bio-psycho-social-spiritual needs that are all interrelated and that impact each other in terms of complexity of the problem and approaches to help resolve the problem. People we support must have all of their needs addressed to reach their highest level of functioning. And hopefully more healthcare agencies will be putting these services together under one roof to provide convenience and comprehensive level of care for the people being supported. This will also encourage collaboration among health care providers."
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