Contents: Introduction: Meaning of mental health and illness -- Ego defence or mental mechanism -- Personality theories and types -- Evolution of psychiatry: Philosophers of psychiatry and some milestones -- History of psychiatry nursing -- Rights and duties of a nurse -- Qualities of a nurse -- Symptomatology: Signs, symptoms, cause and misconceptions of mental illness -- Mental health assessment: The Psychiatric interview -- Meeting the patient -- Nurse-patient relationship -- Observation and recording of mental illness -- Process recording -- Community mental health: National mental health programme -- Rehabilitation and community services -- Psychiatric nursing practices -- Rhabilitation requirements -- General principles of psychiatric nursing -- Therapeutic techniques in psychiatric nursing -- Mental disorders: Classification of mental illness -- Organic disorders -- Functional disorders -- Drug addiction and alcoholism -- Personality disorders -- Sexual anomalies -- Neuroses -- Epilepsy -- Mental retardation -- Bio-psychosocial therapies: Psychopharmacology or pharmacotherapy -- Therapies in psychiatry -- Somatic illnesses: Psychophysiological disorders -- Psychiatric problems in children -- Disorders of puerperium, old age and adolescence -- A Case study on bipolar affective disorder -- Crisis in psychiatry nursing: Legagal aspects in Indian psychiatry.