Case Study: Holistic care

John is a 27-year-old man with mental health (depression) and learning difficulties. He is seen by a mental health nurse at his home once every two weeks for support with monitoring his mental health and his medication. John lives alone and so struggles to maintain social relationships and can get quite lonely at times. This reduces his motivation to look after himself properly, e.g. going food shopping.

Although the priority for the team is to ensure that John remains concordant with his medication his care plan also reflects the things that he finds important and things which can help promote recovery. As a result his care plan identifies that his nurse will spend time supporting John with his social needs, helping him to link in with local day centres in the community, a local befriending scheme run by a charity and a once-a-week support worker who takes John swimming in the local pool. All these are clearly documented in his personalised care plan, which John has a copy of.

By taking this holistic view, prioritizing John’s personally identified needs, and not focusing solely on medication management, his nurse has helped support his recovery and promote good mental health.