lucyb-90 (Offline)  

Nope i haven't are we supposed to have? And have you heard from NHS bursaries? Apparently the NHS people don't contact you till 3 months before, so i guess i shouldn't hear till June.

After the group interview you are all sent outside and brought back in one at a time for an individual interview, in which they basically ask you why you want to be a mental health nurse, and they let you do the talking. Talk about people you know who are nurses, depictions in the media and film, like Girl, Interrupted, how interesting and rewarding it sounds, how your caring personality suits it, childhood dreams etc etc etc. But also bring up how you would manage at uni with the workload, say youll set action plans and keep diaries and mention how it is different to other degrees in that you will be on placement and be gaining experience which suits your learning style of hands on learning and your outgoing personality. Just bull**** them basically, you'll do fine despite possibly feeling out of your comfort zone

Good luck, and let me know if you need anything else x

Then you get called out into small groups of 5 for a group interview by two nurses and you have a group discussion where you are given points for things you do and don't do/say. They ask you about the qualities needed specific to mental health nursing and then spoke about issues in the NHS. They will be taking notes on you as you speak and its kind of dog eat dog here to catch their attention, try not to allow them to ask you specifically anything, it was kind of awkward when it happened to a couple of the others when they had to have answers or opinions prized out of them. Whatever you do, don't be shy. Make up something, just express an opinion. I found myself talking about a government initiative to pour money into mental health awareness for children and it doesn't even exist, but all my other points had been brought up by other people but if you sell it well enough they'll buy it, its more about your opinion on the affects for patients that issues may have that is important here.

Hey, yeah I was interviewed for mental health nursing

In my interview I was given a presentation where a boy has a psychotic episode and is mistreated by NHS staff who fail to meet the needs of him or view him as a threat to his mother despite the fact he was setting some curtains alight. You have to write a short essay explaining what you could have done differently to accommodate the needs of the service user and everyone involved, i.e his mother.