Dr Celeste Foster
School of Health & Society
Current positions
Reader in Mental Health
Biography
Celeste is a Reader in mental health, with a specialism in children and young people’s mental health, within the Directorate of Nursing and Midwifery, School of Health & Society, at the University of Salford.
Celeste is a senior adolescent mental health nurse, registered adolescent psychotherapist and academic who has been working in Child and Adolescent Mental Health, since 1995.
She has published in the subjects of psychoanalytic approaches to working with adolescents and their professional networks, self-harm, complex psychosomatic presentations and developmental trauma. She has led several multi-professional research studies investigating effective whole-school approaches to pupil emotional wellbeing, interventions for families of children with neurodevelopmental conditions and interventions for adolescents with complex and severe mental health needs.
Throughout her academic career she has worked with practice partners to develop CAMH-related teaching and learning products, commercial enterprise projects and research partnerships. Celeste completed her PhD by published works in 2021 and her portfolio of papers includes the first published peer-reviewed research study in the field of Adolescent Psychiatric Intensive Care Nursing. She currently leads a multi-disciplinary team developing a digital wearable device and software to help young people in hospital settings who self-harm; and is working with the Queen’s Nursing Institute in Scotland to evaluate their innovative new training programme for primary care nurses (The Complexity and Adversity Network).
Areas of Research
Child and Adolescent Mental Health, CAMHS, Adolescence/Adolescent development, Mental health nursing identity and models of care, Self-harm and suicide, Emotional health and wellbeing in school settings, Developmental trauma, Adolescent psychodynamic psychotherapy, Application of psychoanalytic theory and research methods to nursing; digital technology in CYP mental health
Publications
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Investigating the impact of a psychoanalytic nursing development group within an adolescent psychiatric intensive care unit (PICU)
Foster, C. (2020). Investigating the impact of a psychoanalytic nursing development group within an adolescent psychiatric intensive care unit (PICU). Archives of Psychiatric Nursing, 34(6), 481-491. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apnu.2020.08.008
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Understanding the nature of mental health nursing within CAMHS PICU: 1. Identifying nursing interventions that contribute to the recovery journey of young people
Foster, C., & Smedley, K. (2019). Understanding the nature of mental health nursing within CAMHS PICU: 1. Identifying nursing interventions that contribute to the recovery journey of young people. Journal of Psychiatric Intensive Care, 15(2), 87-102. https://doi.org/10.20299/jpi.2019.012
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Understanding the Developmental Impact of Domestic Violence and Adverse Experiences in Childhood across the Life-Course
Foster, C., & Gardner, L. (2023). Understanding the Developmental Impact of Domestic Violence and Adverse Experiences in Childhood across the Life-Course. In J. Roddy (Ed.), Working with Client Experiences of Domestic Abuse (117-132). Taylor & Francis (Routledge). https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003253266-9
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Enabling practitioners working with young people who self-harm
Foster, C., Birch, L., Allen, S., & Rayner, G. (2015). Enabling practitioners working with young people who self-harm. Journal of Mental Health Training, Education and Practice, 10(4), 268-280. https://doi.org/10.1108/JMHTEP-05-2014-0011