Issues in mental health nursing
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Issues Ment Health Nurs · Dec 2006
Conventionalized knowledge: mental health nurses producing clinical knowledge at intershift handovers.
Mental health nurses routinely hand over clinical knowledge at intershift reports. In the present study, field descriptions from prolonged fieldwork and transcripts of audio recordings of handovers were analysed discursively drawing on ethnomethodology and conversation analysis. ⋯ The interactional handovers were relatively more substantial but did also bring forth obvious signs of uncertainty regarding exact clinical situations. Handing over caused a silencing of the least powerful nurses' voices, generated uncertainty, and promoted knowledge about the patients' clinical situation that was not necessarily precise or up-to-date.