Restrictive interventions: nurses should be ‘very clear’ about practice, warns academic
University lecturer and learning disability nurse James Ridley spoke to delegates at RCNi nursing webinar
Nurses need to be ‘very clear’ about why they are using restrictive practices or interventions, a senior nurse academic has warned.
Edge Hill University senior lecturer and learning disability nurse James Ridley’s talk at the RCNi learning disability nursing webinar looked at a human rights-based approaches to restrictive practice.
Important to understand service users’ trauma and pain needs
‘I am not saying every person may not require restrictive interventions, however, what I am saying is that we need to be very clear about why we are using restrictive practices or interventions or considering them,’ he told delegates.
Mr Ridley added it was important to understand a person’s mental and physical health, trauma and pain needs.
People need to have a health action plan and healthcare professionals should take into account if they have a certain way they want to be cared for, he said.
‘Look at their life story, people might have come in having had a horrendous experience of a certain aspect of care,’ he said.
Practitioners and clinicians should be designing a more effective environment, not fixing people
He added that the pain management of people with learning disabilities can often be poor and medications should be reviewed to check they are appropriate.
And he said nurses should be having conversations with families and other clinicians and that it was important to have a debrief. ‘We need to look at the tools we have available to us,’ he said.
‘Our job as practitioners and clinicians is not about fixing people, but about designing a more effective environment.’
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