Psychiatric Evaluation
Obtaining a psychiatric evaluation can help ease your mental health issues.
A psychiatric evaluation is often necessary to diagnose behavioral disorders, mental illness, emotional disorders or development disorders. The evaluation provides a clear picture of the individual’s current emotional health, social well-being and physical health which can then be used to determine a plan of action for treatment if there is a behavioral problem or similar condition diagnosed.
The treatment professional will evaluate the behaviors of the individual in relation to his or her genetic composition, physical health, cognitive abilities, emotional attitude, and level of education. The psychiatric evaluation will determine if and how these components of everyday life could be affected as a result of the behaviors that are being exhibited and will then make a determination as to whether a diagnosis is necessary in order to provide effective treatment and care.
Who Receives a Psychiatric Evaluation?
It’s very common for a family member, spouse, loved one or friend to first notice that there could be a problem with an individual emotionally. Certain conditions may noticeably cause disruption, sadness, rebellion or other challenges that are seemingly disruptive. When a loved one notices that their family member or friend suffers from challenges with emotional expression, substance abuse or a similar problem there is often a psychiatric evaluation performed to diagnose the problem and seek effective treatment.
When problems consistently arise in relationships, at work, at school, or when an individual has trouble coping or if development seems to be slow there is often a need for a psychiatric evaluation to determine if there is some underlying mental health condition which may be causing these problems or which may be making seemingly minor situations a big deal.
What is Involved in a Psychiatric Evaluation?
The various components that are involved in a psychiatric evaluation will depend on the individual symptoms and on the evaluator. Each case is different and each individual is different so the evaluation may consist of any number of the following items:
- psychiatric interview
- family history workup
- personal history workup
- x-rays
- blood tests
- laboratory tests
- medical history
- assessment of individual health
- assessment of behaviors
- assessment of emotional health
- psychological assessments
- language assessments
- educational assessments
Being Honest
The most important thing to remember when you or a loved one is being evaluated for psychological well-being is that you must be honest with the evaluator. Your answers and the details that you provide during a psychiatric evaluation will be used to diagnose you and the diagnosis will be used to determine a course of treatment. Without honesty, there could be missed details or the diagnosis may be thrown off which can lead to ineffective treatment or the wrong treatment all together.
If you don’t know the answer to a question, let the evaluator know that you are unsure. If you are taking medications, alert the treatment professional to this as well. Don’t be the judge of whether or not a detail may not mean anything, leave this up to the treatment professional to decide.
