Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay
For this Assignment, you practice assessing and diagnosing patients with anxiety disorders, PTSD, and OCD. Review the DSM-5 criteria for the disorders within these classifications before you get started, as you will be asked to justify your differential diagnosis with DSM-5 criteria.
To Prepare:
- View your assigned video case and review the additional data for the case in the “Case History Reports” document, keeping the requirements of the evaluation template in mind.
- Consider what history would be necessary to collect from this patient.
- Consider what interview questions you would need to ask this patient.
- Identify at least three possible differential diagnoses for the patient. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
Complete and submit your Comprehensive Psychiatric Evaluation, including your differential diagnosis and critical-thinking process to formulate primary diagnosis.
Incorporate the following into your responses in the template:
- Subjective: What details did the patient provide regarding their chief complaint and symptomology to derive your differential diagnosis? What is the duration and severity of their symptoms? How are their symptoms impacting their functioning in life?
- Objective: What observations did you make during the psychiatric assessment?
- Assessment: Discuss the patient’s mental status examination results. What were your differential diagnoses? Provide a minimum of three possible diagnoses with supporting evidence, listed in order from highest priority to lowest priority. Compare the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for each differential diagnosis and explain what DSM-5 criteria rules out the differential diagnosis to find an accurate diagnosis. Explain the critical-thinking process that led you to the primary diagnosis you selected. Include pertinent positives and pertinent negatives for the specific patient case.
- Reflection notes: What would you do differently with this client if you could conduct the session over? Also include in your reflection a discussion related to legal/ethical considerations (demonstrate critical thinking beyond confidentiality and consent for treatment!), health promotion and disease prevention taking into consideration patient factors (such as age, ethnic group, etc.), PMH, and other risk factors (e.g., socioeconomic, cultural background, etc.).
Training Title 40
Name: Ms. Barbara Weider Gender: female Age: 56 years old
T-99.0 P-99 R 24 BP 132/89 Ht 5’4 Wt 168lbs
Background: Lives with her husband in Knoxville, TN, has one daughter age 23. She has never worked. Raised by mother, she never knew her father. Mother with hx of anxiety; no substance hx for patient or family. No previous psychiatric treatment. Has one glass red wine with dinner. Sleeps10-12hrs; appetite decreased. Has overactive bladder, untreated. Allergic to Phenergan; complains of headaches, takes prn ibuprofen, has diarrhea once weekly, takes OTC Imodium.
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:
Weider -She nervously plays with her scarf as she breathes anxiously]
Physician- Hello Mrs. Weider. Are you ok? Do you want some water or something?
WEIDRE I’m ok. I’m fine.
Physician- I understand you wanted to see me today.
Patient- She breathes anxiously]
Patient- I just really needed to sit and talk.
Physician- Well, tell me what’s wrong, what are you feeling?
Patient- I’m just so… so unsure. I’m tired of being stuck in my house. I don’t like it. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
Physician- Stuck in your house? Do you have difficultly leaving your house?
Patient- Yes. All the time.
Physician- When do you go out?
Patient…maybe, once or twice.
Physician- A day?
Patient- [She clutches her hands to her chest]
Patient- A week. Tuesdays and Saturdays.
Physician- Why Tuesday and Saturday?
Patient- Because when my husband gets home, he can go with me.
Physician- What do you do when you go out?
Patient- I take walks.
Physician- Where do you walk?
Patient- I only go to the end of the block, and then I cross the street, and turn around, and I go back around the cul-de-sac. I’ll do that three times. [Losing breathe] No more, then I have to go back inside… I also go in my backyard. That’s usually okay.
Physician- On the walks, why do you have to go back after three times? What happens?
Patient- [She nervously looks around] I just can’t go any further.
Physician- Is this a physical problem, knees or something?
Patient- [She plays with her scarf]
Patient- No. No. Well… maybe. I just can’t breathe if I’m out any longer.
Physician- Oh, breathing?
Patient- Yeah.
Physician- What do you feel?
Patient- [Her voice quivering] I’m just so frightened. Really, really scared. You don’t realize what it took for me to get here today. I really had to. I willed it. I closed my eyes and my husband turned the radio up all the way as he drove. And then he lead me into the building.
Physician- Is there something that triggers this, anything in particular?
Patient- I don’t like people. Maybe that’s it. I mean I can tolerate them. Ethan, the little boy next door, I’ll bake things for him and say hello. Sometimes, sometimes I watch him when his parents are gone. I mean I can be around people. Maybe that’s not that’s not what I meant.
Physician- Ok, can you walk me through what happens when you do leave the house? Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
Patient- I get shortness of breath, everything, the world just seems to close in on me, and everything gets feels really tight, the air in my body, my chest. I get dizzy. I don’t know what’s wrong… I could be sick. What is this?
Physician- There can be many different causes for this. What is it that frightens you?
Patient- [She’s short of breathe] Death. I’m afraid to die.
Physician- You’re afraid you might die?
Patient- Yes. Among other things but that’s what pops into my head.
Physician- Is there other stuff?
Patient- Cars go to fast. And there’s murders and rapes that I see on the news. And flashfloods. I just think its close, its safer to stay close to home.
Physician- How long have you had this fear?
Patient- I don’t really know.
Physician- Do you know when it all started?
Patient- I’m not sure.
Physician- Do you know what started it?
Patient- No.
Physician- When was the last time you really ventured out for any length of time?
Patient- Fifteen years.
Patient- [She nervously shifts in her chair]
Physician- That long. Is this the farthest you’ve been in fifteen years? What happened fifteen years ago?
Patient- I don’t really know.
Physician- There is nothing that happened to you personally that could have made you afraid of dying?
Patient- I always was. My mother died the year before that. But it happened little by little. First it was planes. And then I couldn’t drive on the freeway, then I couldn’t drive at all, then errands, then it was going out… and soon… here I am.
Physician- It must have taken you extraordinary courage to come here today. What finally brought you to see me?
Patient- My grandson was born. But I couldn’t go and see him. I still haven’t seen him. My daughter gave birth last week and she’s not going to bring him to see me for several months and I don’t want to wait that long. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
Physician- You miss out.
Patient- Yes! Of course, I do! My grandson is a thousand miles away and I can’t leave the God damned house.
Resources
https://dsm-psychiatryonline-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/doi/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596.dsm05
https://dsm-psychiatryonline-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/doi/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596.dsm06
https://dsm-psychiatryonline-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/doi/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596.dsm07
Sadock, B. J., Sadock, V. A., & Ruiz, P. (2015). Kaplan & Sadock’s synopsis of psychiatry (11th ed.). Wolters Kluwer.
INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO USE EXEMPLAR AND TEMPLATE—READ CAREFULLY
If you are struggling with the format or remembering what to include, follow the Comprehensive Psychiatric Evaluation Template AND the Rubric as your guide. It is also helpful to review the rubric in detail in order not to lose points unnecessarily because you missed something required. Below highlights by category are taken directly from the grading rubric for the assignment in Weeks 4–10. After reviewing the full details of the rubric, you can use it as a guide. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
In the Subjective section, provide:
- Chief complaint
- History of present illness (HPI)
- Past psychiatric history
- Medication trials and current medications
- Psychotherapy or previous psychiatric diagnosis
- Pertinent substance use, family psychiatric/substance use, social, and medical history
- Allergies
- ROS
- Read rating descriptions to see the grading standards!
In the Objective section, provide:
- Physical exam documentation of systems pertinent to the chief complaint, HPI, and history
- Diagnostic results, including any labs, imaging, or other assessments needed to develop the differential diagnoses.
- Read rating descriptions to see the grading standards!
In the Assessment section, provide:
- Results of the mental status examination, presented in paragraph form.
- At least three differentials with supporting evidence. List them from top priority to least priority. Compare the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for each differential diagnosis and explain what DSM-5 criteria rules out the differential diagnosis to find an accurate diagnosis. Explain the critical-thinking process that led you to the primary diagnosis you selected. Include pertinent positives and pertinent negatives for the specific patient case.
- Read rating descriptions to see the grading standards!
Reflect on this case. Include: Discuss what you learned and what you might do differently. Also include in your reflection a discussion related to legal/ethical considerations (demonstrate critical thinking beyond confidentiality and consent for treatment!), health promotion and disease prevention taking into consideration patient factors (such as age, ethnic group, etc.), PMH, and other risk factors (e.g., socioeconomic, cultural background, etc.). Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
(The comprehensive evaluation is typically the initial new patient evaluation. You will practice writing this type of note in this course. You will be ruling out other mental illnesses so often you will write up what symptoms are present and what symptoms are not present from illnesses to demonstrate you have indeed assessed for all illnesses which could be impacting your patient. For example, anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, bipolar symptoms, psychosis symptoms, substance use, etc.)
EXEMPLAR BEGINS HERE
CC (chief complaint): A brief statement identifying why the patient is here. This statement is verbatim of the patient’s own words about why presenting for assessment. For a patient with dementia or other cognitive deficits, this statement can be obtained from a family member.
HPI: Begin this section with patient’s initials, age, race, gender, purpose of evaluation, current medication and referral reason. For example:
N.M. is a 34-year-old Asian male presents for psychiatric evaluation for anxiety. He is currently prescribed sertraline which he finds ineffective. His PCP referred him for evaluation and treatment.
Or
P.H., a 16-year-old Hispanic female, presents for psychiatric evaluation for concentration difficulty. She is not currently prescribed psychotropic medications. She is referred by her therapist for medication evaluation and treatment.
Then, this section continues with the symptom analysis for your note. Thorough documentation in this section is essential for patient care, coding, and billing analysis.
Paint a picture of what is wrong with the patient. First what is bringing the patient to your evaluation. Then, include a PSYCHIATRIC REVIEW OF SYMPTOMS. The symptoms onset, duration, frequency, severity, and impact. Your description here will guide your differential diagnoses. You are seeking symptoms that may align with many DSM-5 diagnoses, narrowing to what aligns with diagnostic criteria for mental health and substance use disorders.
Past Psychiatric History: This section documents the patient’s past treatments. Use the mnemonic Go Cha MP.
General Statement: Typically, this is a statement of the patients first treatment experience. For example: The patient entered treatment at the age of 10 with counseling for depression during her parents’ divorce. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay. OR The patient entered treatment for detox at age 26 after abusing alcohol since age 13.
Caregivers are listed if applicable.
Hospitalizations: How many hospitalizations? When and where was last hospitalization? How many detox? How many residential treatments? When and where was last detox/residential treatment? Any history of suicidal or homicidal behaviors? Any history of self-harm behaviors?
Medication trials: What are the previous psychotropic medications the patient has tried and what was their reaction? Effective, Not Effective, Adverse Reaction? Some examples: Haloperidol (dystonic reaction), risperidone (hyperprolactinemia), olanzapine (effective, insurance wouldn’t pay for it)
Psychotherapy or Previous Psychiatric Diagnosis: This section can be completed one of two ways depending on what you want to capture to support the evaluation. First, does the patient know what type? Did they find psychotherapy helpful or not? Why? Second, what are the previous diagnosis for the client noted from previous treatments and other providers. Thirdly, you could document both.
Substance Use History: This section contains any history or current use of caffeine, nicotine, illicit substance (including marijuana), and alcohol. Include the daily amount of use and last known use. Include type of use such as inhales, snorts, IV, etc. Include any histories of withdrawal complications from tremors, Delirium Tremens, or seizures.
Family Psychiatric/Substance Use History: This section contains any family history of psychiatric illness, substance use illnesses, and family suicides. You may choose to use a genogram to depict this information. Be sure to include a reader’s key to your genogram or write up in narrative form.
Social History: This section may be lengthy if completing an evaluation for psychotherapy or shorter if completing an evaluation for psychopharmacology. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay. However, at a minimum, please include:
Where patient was born, who raised the patient
Number of brothers/sisters (what order is the patient within siblings)
Who the patient currently lives with in a home? Are they single, married, divorced, widowed? How many children?
Educational Level
Hobbies:
Work History: currently working/profession, disabled, unemployed, retired?
Legal history: past hx, any current issues?
Trauma history: Any childhood or adult history of trauma?
Violence Hx: Concern or issues about safety (personal, home, community, sexual (current & historical)
Medical History: This section contains any illnesses, surgeries, include any hx of seizures, head injuries.
Current Medications: Include dosage, frequency, length of time used, and reason for use. Also include OTC or homeopathic products.
Allergies: Include medication, food, and environmental allergies separately. Provide a description of what the allergy is (e.g., angioedema, anaphylaxis). This will help determine a true reaction vs. intolerance.
Reproductive Hx: Menstrual history (date of LMP), Pregnant (yes or no), Nursing/lactating (yes or no), contraceptive use (method used), types of intercourse: oral, anal, vaginal, other, any sexual concerns
ROS: Cover all body systems that may help you include or rule out a differential diagnosis. Please note: THIS IS DIFFERENT from a physical examination!
You should list each system as follows: General: Head: EENT: etc. You should list these in bullet format and document the systems in order from head to toe. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
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Example of Complete ROS:
GENERAL: No weight loss, fever, chills, weakness, or fatigue.
HEENT: Eyes: No visual loss, blurred vision, double vision, or yellow sclerae. Ears, Nose, Throat: No hearing loss, sneezing, congestion, runny nose, or sore throat.
SKIN: No rash or itching.
CARDIOVASCULAR: No chest pain, chest pressure, or chest discomfort. No palpitations or edema.
RESPIRATORY: No shortness of breath, cough, or sputum.
GASTROINTESTINAL: No anorexia, nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea. No abdominal pain or blood.
GENITOURINARY: Burning on urination, urgency, hesitancy, odor, odd color
NEUROLOGICAL: No headache, dizziness, syncope, paralysis, ataxia, numbness, or tingling in the extremities. No change in bowel or bladder control.
MUSCULOSKELETAL: No muscle, back pain, joint pain, or stiffness.
HEMATOLOGIC: No anemia, bleeding, or bruising.
LYMPHATICS: No enlarged nodes. No history of splenectomy.
ENDOCRINOLOGIC: No reports of sweating, cold, or heat intolerance. No polyuria or polydipsia.
Physical exam (If applicable and if you have opportunity to perform—document if exam is completed by PCP): From head to toe, include what you see, hear, and feel when doing your physical exam. You only need to examine the systems that are pertinent to the CC, HPI, and History. Do not use “WNL” or “normal.” You must describe what you see. Always document in head-to-toe format i.e., General: Head: EENT: etc.
Diagnostic results: Include any labs, X-rays, or other diagnostics that are needed to develop the differential diagnoses (support with evidenced and guidelines).
Assessment
Mental Status Examination: For the purposes of your courses, this section must be presented in paragraph form and not use of a checklist! This section you will describe the patient’s appearance, attitude, behavior, mood and affect, speech, thought processes, thought content, perceptions (hallucinations, pseudohallucinations, illusions, etc.)., cognition, insight, judgment, and SI/HI. See an example below. You will modify to include the specifics for your patient on the above elements—DO NOT just copy the example. You may use a preceptor’s way of organizing the information if the MSE is in paragraph form.
He is an 8-year-old African American male who looks his stated age. He is cooperative with examiner. He is neatly groomed and clean, dressed appropriately. There is no evidence of any abnormal motor activity. His speech is clear, coherent, normal in volume and tone. His thought process is goal directed and logical. There is no evidence of looseness of association or flight of ideas. His mood is euthymic, and his affect appropriate to his mood. He was smiling at times in an appropriate manner. He denies any auditory or visual hallucinations. Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay. There is no evidence of any delusional thinking. He denies any current suicidal or homicidal ideation. Cognitively, he is alert and oriented. His recent and remote memory is intact. His concentration is good. His insight is good.
Differential Diagnoses: You must have at least three differentials with supporting evidence. Explain what rules each differential in or out and justify your primary diagnosis selection. You will use supporting evidence from the literature to support your rationale. Include pertinent positives and pertinent negatives for the specific patient case.
Also included in this section is the reflection. Reflect on this case and discuss whether or not you agree with your preceptor’s assessment and diagnostic impression of the patient and why or why not. What did you learn from this case? What would you do differently?
Also include in your reflection a discussion related to legal/ethical considerations (demonstrating critical thinking beyond confidentiality and consent for treatment!), health promotion and disease prevention taking into consideration patient factors (such as age, ethnic group, etc.), PMH, and other risk factors (e.g., socioeconomic, cultural background, etc.).
References (move to begin on next page)
You are required to include at least three evidence-based, peer-reviewed journal articles or evidenced-based guidelines which relate to this case to support your diagnostics and differentials diagnoses. Be sure to use correct APA 7th edition formatting . Assessing and Diagnosing Patients with Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, and OCD Essay.
