profile

system. He can offer brief interventions on

drugs and alcohol and anxiety, in combination with a strengths-based approach.
Hammond is often working under pressure If I see a young man more than
once, Im lucky. If I can work with a small
group of young men over a six-week period
on health issues, thats a real bonus.
Attitudes and resources are among the
barriers to young men getting the holistic health care they need. Hammond says
mens health is as much about mental
health and well-being as physical health
and says not all professionals are prepared
to work with young people.
As well as emotionally present fathers,
he believes good mothers are vital to young
mens well-being. Its important they give
their young men permission to talk about
health and to explore with them what
health means.

Taking emotional risks

He urges young men to take more risks with
their emotional health. They take risks
skateboarding, drinking, as boy racers, but
theyre not so open to taking emotional
risks to opening up and talking, to asking
a girl/boy/other out, to seeking help. As
well as mates, I stress the importance
of talking to an adult if they are worried
about anything.
Masculinity myths are tough on young
men. The perception is that to be a man
is to be tough, to suck it up; to be a tough
Kiwi bloke the quintessential Southern
Man.
When young men cant live up to the
expectations placed on them be they academic, employment or sporting they feel
a sense of failure and really struggle. That
sense of failure is not confined to young

men, Hammond said, as farmer suicide

statistics attest. If I can help young men
change their attitude about themselves, to
look at themselves in more positive ways
thats why I do this job.
Hammond says he brings his toolbox of
life experience and professional skills to
his role. I left school at 15 and my own
journey was a little rocky. I bring trust and
integrity to the relationship and my life
skills have equipped me well for this role.
Empathy is hugely important.
He was a psychiatric assistant at the
long-closed Cherry Farm Mental Hospital,
near Dunedin, and worked as an enrolled
nurse in paediatrics for 13 years before
completing the inaugural nursing degree at
Otago Polytechnic and getting his PHN job
in 1995.
A father of four and grandfather of seven,
he is very family-orientated and believes
that is one of his strengths in his role.
Another aspect of his role is involvement
in the HazDrink initiative. Any 16- and
17-year-olds admitted to Dunedin Hospitals emergency department (ED) with alcohol-related injuries are asked to consent
to PHN follow-up. Hammond sees about 50
per cent of those referred by the ED. He offers them strategies for keeping safe while
drinking while stressing that ending up in
ED because of drinking is serious.
Hammond said it helps to be an optimist
and he gets great personal and professional
satisfaction in playing a part, however
small, in helping young men reach their
potential.
These young men also want to be
happy, to have fun and need professional
guidance and support while their maturity
is kicking into play. I love being part of
their journey.

Some New Zealand mens health facts

Every three hours a Kiwi bloke dies from a potentially preventable illness. If
you are Mori, that rate doubles.
One in eight men experience severe depression at some time in their lives.
Testicular cancer kills more 18-39-year-old men than any other disease.
Six out of 10 men are overweight.
Nearly a quarter of men smoke.
Twenty-seven per cent of men have potentially hazardous drinking patterns.
Reference
1) Mens Health Week Te Wiki Hauora Tane 2015 (2015) Health Info. Did you know . . . www.menshealthweek.co.nz. Retrieved
03/07/15.

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Kai Tiaki Nursing New Zealand * vol 21 no 6 * July 2015

Talking
about
depression
and anxiety

aising awareness of some of the mental

health issues men face, in particular anxiety and depression, was the aim of three
positive mental health workshops for Canterbury District Health Board staff last month.
The One for the Blokes workshops were
organised by the staff wellness programme and
facilitated by psychotherapist Jason Brennan
and wellness consultant Pete Roe, from Wellingtons Think Well facility.
While stress was part of life and had many
positive effects in relation to getting tasks
achieved, efficiency could plummet when
stress was cumulative and from multiple
sources, Roe said. It was essential to recognise
when stress turned into distress. Indicators
included when it overwhelmed our coping
abilities, when it demotivated and drained
energy, and when it led to decreased performance. Ongoing distress, he said, predisposed
us to anxiety and depression and was often
when men could hurt the people they love.
Modern technology, Brennan said, was
making it increasingly difficult to cut off from
work because people could now contact us 24
hours a day. He explained human beings were
born naturally optimistic but learn to be pessimistic over our lives and became very good
at thinking negatively.
Human beings were wired to pick up
threats our chemicals warn us. While
adrenaline and cortisol kicked our system
into action by activating survival responses,
their ongoing presence and accumulation, in
response to worry and perceived threat, could
set up a destructive and distressing cycle for
psychological health.
Warning signs, according to Roe, included
feelings of helplessness and hopelessness,
unusual anger, irritability, changes in appetite
and sleep, increased social isolation, negative
thoughts, reckless behaviour, loss of interest
in daily activities and persistent unexplained
pain. Coping strategies needed to be individual, as no one size fitted all. Keeping a regular

profile

daily routine, talking to significant others,

seeking professional help, structuring time by
creating a work/home balance, exercising and
temporarily avoiding life-altering decisions
could all be worthwhile responses.
The DHBs well-being coordinator, Andy
Hearn, highlighted that mindfulness sessions,
yoga, Pilates, site-based brief intervention
counselling and a more expansive counselling service via the employment assistance
programme, were all available to staff.
The important message that depression
could happen to anybody was reinforced by
two mens personal accounts of depression.
The first, an ex-police officer, spoke of the
role compassion fatigue and alcohol misuse
played, and how family relationships became
strained. I bottled it all up at work and let go
at home.
When first diagnosed, he viewed it as a
weakness to be weak. His recovery involved
multiple life adjustments, including changing
careers, forming balanced social connections,
diet and exercise modifications, and cultivating a deeper sense of self-awareness. Medication, although initially trialed, didnt work.
Establishing planks of wellness was essential. These are the things that got me well
and keep me well.
The second personal story, told by a selfdescribed staunch, driven and arrogant
builder, highlighted how depression could
permeate multiple aspects of daily life. His
depression and anxiety, which followed the
death of a spouse after a long illness, was
something he initially hid from others before
recognising I couldnt sort it out by myself.
A sign of strength, he learned, was putting
up your hand for help being honest can be
liberating.
He described the roles medication and counselling played in his recovery and the realisation that you cant look after your children
without looking after yourself. He spoke of
learning the overlap between mental and physical health my physical and mental health
are definitely tied together and emphasised
the importance of creating a family environment that fostered emotional sharing.
A consistent message from the four presenters was the importance of having a close circle
of emotional support. Those attending the
workshop were encouraged to think who these
people might be. Consider who is in your
inner circle, who are the important people in
your life, who are those that matter to you.
Report by Christchurch mental health nurse
Bernadette Burns

Stresses on rural men

Geraldine practice nurse Maree Rowley.

By co-editor Kathy Stodart

he ups and downs of farming life can

take their toll on mens health when
times are tough, men tend to put
supporting their family financially and the
welfare of their animals first, and neglect
themselves. Thats the view of practice
nurse Maree Rowley, who was born and
raised in rural South Canterbury and has
lived and worked in the region all her life.
I understand how gut-wrenching it can
be, through no fault or mismanagement of
your own, that you can have a drought that
puts you on your knees and you have to sell
half your capital stock, she said.
Dealing with floods, drought and snow
or for dairy farmers, with a vastly reduced
milk payout from Fonterra was extremely
stressful for farmers, and could lead to
elevated blood pressure, anger, excessive
drinking, insomnia and depression, she said.
However, the stress they were under could

make them even less likely to seek

help for their health than usual.
But theyre no good to anybody if
they keel over, she said.
Rowley has nursed for 21 years,
the first eight in surgery and
orthopaedics at Timaru Hospital,
followed by a long stint as a district nurse in the Timaru, Temuka
and Geraldine areas. She worked
for more than two years for the
Temuka-based Mori health provider Arowhenua Whnau Services
as a primary health nurse, and is
now a practice nurse in Geraldine
where she lives with her husband
and four children.
She is very aware of male health,
both in a professional capacity,
and out of concern for the health
of her close male relatives husband, son, brother and late father.
Getting them [men] through the
door is one of the first things. They
have the attitude: if it aint broke,
dont fix it. Unless they have something seriously wrong acute pain
or are very sick or their significant other is nagging at them,
theres no reason in their mind to come to
the doctor, Rowley said.
Men did not tend to be pro-active in
fronting up for warrant of fitness health
checks until they were older. Practice nurses
had to be opportunistic and engage with
men when they came into the practice for
other reasons, such as if Dad brought in a
child for immunisations or with an injury. Or
if the nurse was seeing the wife or partner,
they could make a general inquiry about
their husbands health.
Rowley said it was probably not a good
thing there were so few men in practice
nursing. Weve never walked in male shoes.
We can gather experiences from the men
in our lives, we can try to have empathy
thats the best we can do.
She said there were many services to
support mens health, but men needed to
take that first step to engage with a health
provider. It was then up to health workers to
build good relationships with them, so they
felt comfortable and would come back.

Kai Tiaki Nursing New Zealand * vol 21 no 6 * July 2015

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Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without
permission.