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Book/media reviews Practising Clinical Supervision: A Reflective Approach John Driscoll Bailliere Tindall in association with the RCN, 2000 ISBN: 0–7020–2419–8, 204 pages Price: £16.95
Clinical supervision, within nursing and health visiting has been formally endorsed by the UKCC since 1996, yet appears to be a patchily embraced source of challenge and support. Ownership of the process, having identified its benefits for yourself rather than taking on a prescribed task of developing standards, seems to be the key to its development. This volume provides assistance to claiming that ownership. It clearly identifies issues which concern those who may wish to gain supervision for themselves as a reflective and supportive tool. The chapters are sequenced to lead the reader toward an understanding of what clinical supervision can provide. It identifies essential skills, blocks to effectiveness and highlights the how and why of monitoring the process while offering suggestions as to how to go about each. Chapter summaries and advance organizers at the head of each section provide direction and a useful identification of discussion issues, indicating its audience as being staff groups as well as individuals. Supporting literature presented is broad and, while largely British Health Service oriented, does not ignore the wider realm of what can be learned from social work and midwifery. It addresses skills development through consideration of such approaches as transactional analysis, 6 category intervention and solution focused practice, giving the enquiring practitioner from any health background much scope for further exploration. The author highlights focus of much existing literature on the development of the supervisor, and argues that effective supervision rests at the supervisees’ door. Supervisee skills are, therefore, not ignored and developing a supervision contract emerges as a central facet. The issue of
© 2000 Harcourt Publishers Ltd doi:10.1054/nedt.2000.0515, available online at http://www.idealibrary.com on
discovering your own supervision agenda is brough out early in the book. In my experience, many practitioners need a great deal of supportive challenge to gain permission from themselves to allow their agendas to move to the fore. Discovering an agenda and having permission to act on it may well be different things, and this leaves room for development in any future editions. Simplistically, a nursing culture in which staff seek out challenge and support as a right to help them achieve their optimum on the professional stage is one in which I believe clinical supervision features prominently. John Driscoll offers direction, without prescription, towards such a culture within a volume that endorses clinical supervision in realistic manner. The book offers splendid assistance to adopting the reflective approach its title suggests. Gordon Knowles Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Health and Social Care, University of West of England
doi:10.1054/nedt.2000.0515, available online at http://www.idealibrary.com on
Men’s Health: Perspectives, Diversity and Paradox Mike Luck, Margaret Bamford and Peter Williamson Blackwell Science, 1999 ISBN: 0–632–05288–0, 268 pages Price: £18.99
This book emerges at a critical time in research and understanding of men’s health and illness behaviour. Recent policies both nationally and internationally are seeking to place men’s health at the centre of many strategies to improve the health of the public. The lack of research-based information and critical discussion of men’s health hampers the development of key initiatives in men’s health. This book sets out to redress the balance in the current situation where
Nurse Education Today
(2000) 20, 593–595
593
Book/media reviews Practising Clinical Supervision: A Reflective Approach John Driscoll Bailliere Tindall in association with the RCN, 2000 ISBN: 0–7020–2419–8, 204 pages Price: £16.95
Clinical supervision, within nursing and health visiting has been formally endorsed by the UKCC since 1996, yet appears to be a patchily embraced source of challenge and support. Ownership of the process, having identified its benefits for yourself rather than taking on a prescribed task of developing standards, seems to be the key to its development. This volume provides assistance to claiming that ownership. It clearly identifies issues which concern those who may wish to gain supervision for themselves as a reflective and supportive tool. The chapters are sequenced to lead the reader toward an understanding of what clinical supervision can provide. It identifies essential skills, blocks to effectiveness and highlights the how and why of monitoring the process while offering suggestions as to how to go about each. Chapter summaries and advance organizers at the head of each section provide direction and a useful identification of discussion issues, indicating its audience as being staff groups as well as individuals. Supporting literature presented is broad and, while largely British Health Service oriented, does not ignore the wider realm of what can be learned from social work and midwifery. It addresses skills development through consideration of such approaches as transactional analysis, 6 category intervention and solution focused practice, giving the enquiring practitioner from any health background much scope for further exploration. The author highlights focus of much existing literature on the development of the supervisor, and argues that effective supervision rests at the supervisees’ door. Supervisee skills are, therefore, not ignored and developing a supervision contract emerges as a central facet. The issue of
© 2000 Harcourt Publishers Ltd doi:10.1054/nedt.2000.0515, available online at http://www.idealibrary.com on
discovering your own supervision agenda is brough out early in the book. In my experience, many practitioners need a great deal of supportive challenge to gain permission from themselves to allow their agendas to move to the fore. Discovering an agenda and having permission to act on it may well be different things, and this leaves room for development in any future editions. Simplistically, a nursing culture in which staff seek out challenge and support as a right to help them achieve their optimum on the professional stage is one in which I believe clinical supervision features prominently. John Driscoll offers direction, without prescription, towards such a culture within a volume that endorses clinical supervision in realistic manner. The book offers splendid assistance to adopting the reflective approach its title suggests. Gordon Knowles Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Health and Social Care, University of West of England
doi:10.1054/nedt.2000.0515, available online at http://www.idealibrary.com on
Men’s Health: Perspectives, Diversity and Paradox Mike Luck, Margaret Bamford and Peter Williamson Blackwell Science, 1999 ISBN: 0–632–05288–0, 268 pages Price: £18.99
This book emerges at a critical time in research and understanding of men’s health and illness behaviour. Recent policies both nationally and internationally are seeking to place men’s health at the centre of many strategies to improve the health of the public. The lack of research-based information and critical discussion of men’s health hampers the development of key initiatives in men’s health. This book sets out to redress the balance in the current situation where
Nurse Education Today
(2000) 20, 593–595
593