There is increasing interest in the use of experiential knowledge and the development of experiential expertise in mental health. Yet, little is known about how best to use this expertise in the role of a psychiatrist. This study aims to gain insight into the concerns of psychiatrists using their lived experiences with mental health distress as a source of knowledge for patients, colleagues and themselves. Eighteen psychiatrists with lived experience as patients in mental health care were interviewed with a semi-structured questionnaire. The interviews were analyzed using qualitative narrative thematic analysis. The majority of the respondents use their lived experience implicitly in the contact with patients, which makes the contact more equal and strengthens the treatment relationship. When explicitly using experiential knowledge in the contact with patients, thought should be given at forehand to its purpose, timing and dosage. Recommendations are that the psychiatrist should be able to reflect on his/her lived experience from a sufficient distance and should take patient factors into account. When working in a team, it is advisable to discuss the use of experiential knowledge in advance with the team. An open organizational culture facilitates the use of experiential knowledge and safety and stability in the team are vital. Current professional codes do not always offer the space to be open. Organizational interests play a role, in the degree of self-disclosure as it can lead to conflict situations and job loss. Respondents unanimously indicated that the use of experiential knowledge in the role of a psychiatrist is a personal decision. Self-reflection and peer supervision with colleagues can be helpful to reflect on different considerations with regard to the use of experiential knowledge. Having personal lived experiences with a mental disorder affects the way psychiatrists think about and performs the profession. The perception of psychopathology becomes more nuanced and there seems to be an increased understanding of the suffering. Even though harnessing experiential knowledge makes the doctor-patient relationship more horizontal it remains unequal because of the difference in roles. However, if adequately used, experiential knowledge can enhance the treatment relationship.
MULTIFILE
Contemporary social work is subjected to ongoing questions in terms of its effectiveness and accountability. It appears to be problematic for social workers to defend themselves in a proper manner. When they do so, they often seem to rely primarily on a rhetoric of good intentions and are thus unable to constructively asses the underlying principles of their work. These considerations have prompted the research outline that is presented in this paper.
As all professionals, teacher educators are expected to develop themselves continuously during their working life in order to keep their knowledge and skills up to date. Smith (2003, p203) distinguishes three reasons for teacher educators to develop themselves: 1) to improve the profession (teacher education); 2) to maintain interest in the profession, to grow personally and professionally and 3) to advance within the profession, promotion. At the teacher education institute of the Fontys University of Applied Science, teacher educators are stimulated by the management to spend 10-15% of their working hours on professional development. Do teacher educators spend these hours and if they dos so, what purpose do they have in mind? What activities do they undertake to develop themselves? What topics do they choose for professional development? Are there differences between more experienced teacher educators and beginning teacher educators? To study these questions, a questionnaire was held by all 228 teacher educators working at the Fontys teacher education institute. At this institute, about 4000 student-teachers are educated to become a teacher in secondary or vocational education. First impressions of the results show that 33% of the teacher educators spend 10-15% of their time on professional development. A large group of teacher educators (42%) spends less then 10% and a small group (23%) spends more then 15% of their time on professional development. The main reason for teacher educators to professionalize themselves is to improve the quality of their teaching to students. This refers to the second reason Smith (2003) mentions. Improving the profession or advance within the profession (reason 1 and 3 in Smith's list) were much less often mentioned. The four activities most mentioned by teacher educators to develop themselves were reading of (scientific) literature (1), followed by collegial consultation (2), attending conferences or meetings (3) and trying out new approaches and systematically evaluating them (4). The topics teacher educators develop themselves in vary from didactical subjects to coaching skills, subject-specific topics and ICT-skills. Further analysis to reveal whether there are differences between experienced and beginning teachers is still in progress, but will be available at the conference in August 2011. References: Smith, K (2003). So, what about the professional development of teacher educators? European Journal of Teacher Education, Vol 26, No2, pp201-215
This Impuls 2020 proposal of ArtEZ University of the Arts focuses on strengthening the institutional structure and organizational infrastructure of its Research and Outreach Unit, by developing and building ArtEZ Research & Outreach. ArtEZ Research & Outreach is a centralized research incubation and development space to facilitate the large communities of researchers at ArtEZ. Based on the portfolio of diverse practices, disciplinary competences, and domain expertise, it explores and develops common grounds for new ways of shared, de-disciplined research and outreach activities across the university and with relevant external partners and stakeholders. The 2 key areas in which Impuls-activities will be performed are: 1. Strategic Research Programming and Networking – Aligning expertise, combining research resources and developing strategic networks Our first objective is to define a long-term Strategic Research Program, to set the directions of urgent and future-proof research topics, directly related to needs and demands from internal (research, education) and external (societal, industrial) stakeholders, with the ambition to create maximum value and impact for researchers, students and professionals and preserving the power of art. This area also includes networking, to develop diverse multi-stakeholder consortia within and around the selected strategic research topics. Our objective is to create multi-lateral exchanges, bringing people together in diverse communities for building consortia to prepare for joint practices of research, impact, accountability, and intervention towards collective research development. 2. Professional Research Support Infrastructure We need to develop and professionalize our research support infrastructure to facilitate professors and researchers in preparing, performing and managing (organizationally and financially) their research projects. The ambition is to increase ArtEZ’ participation in projects for research in the arts, from networking to dissemination and implementation of the research results and output, by developing a strong and sustainable research portfolio and financing strategy.
