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EMERGENCY

In an emergency, always call triple zero (000). It’s a free call from any phone, mobile or phone box.

For other urgent medical issues, go to an Emergency Department.

Our Emergency Departments are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week:

The Richmond Clarence Mental Health Network provides community and inpatient care to clients.  Specialties of the mental health service include adults, child/adolescent and whole family services, older persons services and assessment and treatment care teams in the community.

Contacts:

Shane Scofield

Phone: (02) 6629 4004
Email: shane.scofield@health.nsw.gov.au

GradstartThe ‘Transition to Practice Mental Health Nursing’ program operating in the Richmond/Clarence Mental Health Network is designed to integrate first year newly graduated Registered Nurses into the mental health clinical setting and provide learning opportunities for development toward proficiency in mental health nursing. The structure of the program combines experiential learning in the workplace while the graduate nurse is employed on a 0.75 FTE part time 12-month contract with the Northern NSW Health District. Successful applicants who accept a place on the program will have the opportunity to rotate through a number of inpatient and community settings.

The academic component of the program consists of 24 units of structured learning and group activities on key mental health topics provided by the health service and developed in consultation with the Southern Cross University and delivered over the 12-month period. Assessment of learning will be undertaken throughout the program in a number of ways including written assignments and oral presentations to peers. In addition to experiential and structured learning participants will be supervised and mentored throughout the program. A certificate of completion will be issued to participants on satisfactory completion.

This program has been designed with the aim of firstly transitioning persons from undergraduate study to the workforce and secondly assisting development from new graduate nurse to expert practitioner. The program aims to prepare participants to undertake higher degree study in the area of mental health and successful completion of the program can be used to seek advanced standing in the Southern Cross University Masters Program.