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Nola Rochford NP Mental Health
Nola Rochford NP Mental Health
My nursing career spans 36 years. I trained as a General Obstetric Nurse at Grey Base Hospital, working in medical, surgical, ICU and orthopaedic wards. The realisation of not knowing how to manage posttraumatic stress, depression and anxiety arising in patients I was caring for in ICU motivated me to train as a psychiatric nurse completing a two year bridging course at Seaview Psychiatric Hospital in Hokitika. For eight years I worked as the team leader managing the Acute IPU at Seaview. Other roles included a return to surgical nursing, working as a clinical lecturer for polytechnic students and the last fifteen years as District Manager of Hokitika / South Westland Mental Health Team.
I first began post graduate study in 2000 at Otago Polytechnic and in 2005 graduated with a Master of Arts (Applied) in Nursing from Victoria University with the aim of becoming a nurse practitioner. Enrolment in the Blueprint Leadership and Advance Leadership courses provided the opportunity to do further study at Waikato University completing a postgraduate certificate in management studies. As part of my goal to become a NP in 2009 I completed two pharmacology papers at Auckland University, however was unable to start the prescribing practicum stage due to family commitments. In 2015 I was once again inspired when listening to a ‘Palliative Care Lecture’ where Jenny Carryer presented and spoke of the 50,000 or so nurses who had completed postgraduate education but whom were not necessarily using their new found skills to work to the top of their scope.
To be eligible to become an NP a clinical nursing degree was required. I enrolled in Massey University where I completed the required number of papers to obtain a Clinical Master’s degree in Nursing. I was very fortunate to gain a place on the NPTP training programme and attended Nursing Council in January 2018 and become endorsed as NP officially on February 2nd 2018.
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