Nursing Competencies: Supervision and Consultation

Supervision and consultation are key components of learning to practice psychotherapy competently. Supervision is critical as it allows for objective feedback while implementing the intervention, as well as continual learning and growth as a therapist. Supervision should continue throughout the nurse psychotherapists’ career as they are constantly seeing new clients with different presentations, and gleaning new skills in various types of therapies. Supervision allows nurses to challenge themselves and to continuously become better therapists for the clients they treat. Consultation enables the therapist to ask questions about complex client presentations and can be an extremely valuable way to connect with peers and to seek advice from expert psychotherapists specialising in a particular modality. Naturally, many therapists shy away from supervision and consultation as their own anxiety or ‘imposter syndrome’ may get in the way. This chapter will discuss different types of supervision and consultation that exist, and the importance of this process for the nurse psychotherapist. In addition, the supervision process, roles and responsibilities of supervisors, the supervisory relationship, ethical, legal, and multicultural considerations unique to supervision will be explored. These include but are not limited to managing crisis situations, evaluation in supervision, and becoming an effective supervisor.