Joint programmes – give them a second thought: the value of programmes leading to dual nursing and social work qualifications

The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to the need for a more holistic approach to mental health training that brings together the medical and the social knowledge and skills required by today's practitioners.

The paper is based on the authors' experience of developing, delivering and evaluating a joint mental health programme at London South Bank University between 2004 and 2008.

The authors suggest some advantages of the model as indicated by the scant literature, the findings of a small pilot evaluation study and from information recorded and shared by other university providers of joint programmes – the Joint Programmes Forum. Further investigation is recommended.

The absence of systematic evaluation of joint programmes over the 20 years of their existence and the limitations of the evaluation undertaken by the authors is acknowledged.

It is suggested in the paper that a specialist holistic training that incorporates nursing, social work (and in the future possibly occupational therapy and psychology) knowledge and skills would create well‐prepared professionals to work with mental health and learning disability service user groups (and a similar model could equally be explored for older people and people with physical disabilities or long‐term health conditions). This may be considered as a more successful solution to the effective integration of interprofessional education than the current struggles to superimpose it on uni‐professional courses.