Background: Assessment of undergraduate nursing students' attitudes toward mental illness
is an important aspect as they are the future care providers. Aim: The aim of this study was to
assess the effect of the psychiatric- mental health nursing curriculum on students' attitudes toward
mental illness. Design: A cross-sectional descriptive design was used. Setting: The study was
carried out at the Technical Nursing School of Nasser Institute Hospital for Research and Treatment
affiliated to the Ministry of Health of Egypt at Cairo governorate. Subject: 92 nursing students
were included. Tools: Part one: Socio-demographic questionnaire to assess socio-demographic
characteristics of the nursing students, socio-demographic characteristics of students' parents and
students' knowledge and source of knowledge about mental illness. Part two: Attitude about Mental
Illness scale. Results: There was a highly statistically significant improvement of nursing students'
attitudes percent score toward mental illness regarding all studied dimensions in post- intervention
as compared to the pre- intervention phase. Conclusion: there was a highly statistically significant
positive correlation between all dimensions reflecting nursing students' attitudes toward mental
illness. Recommendations: The study recommend that, the psychiatric mental-health nursing
curriculum of Technical Nursing School of the Ministry Of Health have to be updated. Increasing
awareness of the value of the mental- health nurses and increasing the acceptance of mental illness
starting from the first year of nursing schools.