Suicide and attempted suicide frequently occur in society today and represent a major public health problem. In inpatient psychiatric care the nurse have a central role when caring for suicidal patients. Few systematic studies exists that address the nurse’s practical work with these patients. The purpose of this study was therefore to describe the nursing care of suicidal patients as it was perceived by registered clinical expert nurses. The study has a qualitative approach and was conducted with open thematic interviews with eleven nurses. During the analysis, preformed as a qualitative content analysis, two different themes emerged. These were nursing care as change and nursing care as control/none-control. Change incorporated that the nurse mediated hope, created dialog, carried the patient’s suffering, inspired safety and provided basic nursing care. Control had its’ origin in an inner threat of suicide on the ward which constituted a none-control. Non-control has a paradoxical relation to control since it resulted in an increased activity to assess, observe and control the patient’s behaviour. The control strategies used was according to the nurses stressful both for patient and nurse. Self-examinations and explanations characterised the time after the none-control that a suicide constituted.