Borderline Personality Disorder Nursing Essay

Personality disorders are described as conditions that have some deviation from the considered normal personality state and is characteristically associated with a “range of psychiatric symptoms and aberrant behaviours” (Sansone & Sansone 2009:17). Personality disorder traits (Appendix 1) can be seen to be exaggerated normal human traits (APA 2000) which is a criticism of the concept of personality disorder in that a normal human behaviour can be labelled as deviant when it does not adapt into a particular situation or environment (Baker et al 2011). However it is the use of maladaptive coping strategies means that people with this diagnosis are disproportionately represented within the criminal justice and mental health systems (McVey & Murphy 2010) with studies indicating between 45.7% and 47.4% of prisoners in the UK having a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder (Fazel 2002, Sansone & Sansone 2009).Borderline Personality Disorder Nursing Essay