Mental Health Practitioners
There are many mental health practitioners. Below are some of the few:
- Psychiatrist (DO/MD)
- Psychiatrists complete a medical program and attend residency to become a psychiatrist
- Traditionally, psychiatrists are the only professionals in this field to manage patient’s medications
- They’re considered at the top of the hierarchy
- Psychologist (Ph.D./Psy.D)
- Go through 6-8 years of training.
- They’re trained to perform psychological testing and assessments
- In some states, such as Idaho, New Mexico, Louisiana, Illinois, and Iowa, psychologists are allowed to prescribe medications after they go through appropriate training and receive a license.
- Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner
- A registered nurse who can perform psychological therapy and administer psychiatric medication
- Mental Health Counselor
- A profession that offers counsel to patients.
- Usually received a master’s level education
- Psychiatric Pharmacist
- Complete a post-graduate residency training
Psychiatric Terms:
Please note that this list is not all-inclusive.
- Affect – how someone emotionally respond to stimuli. Usually describe the patient’s emotional state
- Akathisia – Restlessness, cannot sit still
- Anhedonia – The inability to feel happiness or pleasure
- Anosognosia – Unaware of own’s disability
- Belle indifference – Indifference about a disability or symptom
- Cataplexy – Sudden loss of muscle that leads to a collapse.
- Circumstantial speech – Cannot respond to a question without providing excessive detail
- Catatonia – Immobile all day long. Some might perform repetitive movements all day long. Others may be stuck in one pose the entire day.
- Clang association – An association related only by the rhyming of sounds
- Confabulation – Confusing imagination with memory. Usually associated with the alcohol-related disorders.
- Coprolalia – Saying inappropriate phrases
- Delusions – Firmly held false belief systems
- Enuresis – Inability to control urination
- Encopresis – Inappropriate passage of feces
- Folie `a deux – delusional disorder shared by at least two people
- Hallucination – Sensory experience without any stimulus
- Mania – Extreme emotions usually associated with bipolar disorder
- Neologism – nonsensical phrases
- Neurotic – Distress but no delusions or hallucinations
- Psychotic – Hallucination and delusions
- Paraphilia – Intense sexual arousal to atypical objects, behaviors, or a person
- Perserveration – uncontrollable repetition of a particular response
- Pica – Have an appetite for substances that are not foods
- Synesthesia – coupling of certain pairs of actions
- Trichotillomania – Hair-pulling disorder
- Word-salad – confused and repetitious language
- Waxy flexibility – catatonia state where the person can be posed like they’re made of wax
Classification of Mental Disorders
There are two primary guides that are being used to classify different mental disorders.
First is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5)
- Written by psychiatrist
- First published in 2013 and was last updated in 2022 (As of Jan 2023) by the American Psychiatric Association (APA)
- Allow practitioners to use a common language and standard criteria
- DSM-5 is primarily used in the United States
The second tool is the International Classification of Diseases (ICD)
- Published by WHO
- ICD is used more widely in other parts of the world
Types of Mental Disorders
Neurodevelopmental disorders
Includes intellectual disabilities, communication disorders, childhood-onset fluency disorder (stutter), autism spectrum disorder, ADHD, specific learning disorders., and tic disorders.
Schizophrenia
Abnormalities in one or more of the following five domains:
- Delusions
- Hallucinations
- Disorganized thinking
- Grossly disorganized
- Negative symptoms
Includes Schizotypal disorder, schizophrenia, or medication-induced psychotic disorder
Bipolar disorders
Includes bipolar I disorder, bipolar II disorder, cyclothymic disorder, substance or medication induced bipolar or a related disorder
Depressive disorders
Depressive disorders usually present as sad, empty, or irritable moods accompanied by somatic and cognitive changes. Each patient’s severity differs in duration, timing, and presumed etiology. Includes disruptive mood dysregulation disorder, major depressive disorder, persistent depressive disorder (Dysthymia), premenstrual dysphoric disorder, substance or medications induced depressive disorder
Anxiety disorders
To be classified as having anxiety disorders, the patient’s must-have features of excessive fear and anxiety and related behavioral disturbances. Fear is the emotional response to a real or perceived imminent threat. Anxiety is the anticipation of future threats. Includes separation anxiety disorder, selective mutism, specific phobia, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, agoraphobia, generalized anxiety disorder, substance or medication-induced anxiety disorder
Mental Status Exam (MSE)
MSE is performed to determine the patient’s mental and behavioral states.
Components of the mental status exam include appearance, attitude, behavior, speech, affect, mood, thought process, thought content, cognition, and judgment.
Some examples of MSE are the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE)