Assessment
The psychiatric interview
A flexible structure for listening, clarifying and understanding the person’s account.
The library
A place for considered reading.
Explore assessment, psychopathology, conditions and the foundations of practice.
Assessment
Presenting complaint and chronology
Turn a list of complaints into an account of onset, course and functional change.
Assessment
Past, personal and family history
Understand the life course without reducing the person to a list of vulnerabilities.
Assessment
Taking a substance-use history
A clear, nonjudgmental account of exposure, patterns, consequences and change.
Assessment
The mental status examination
Describe the current encounter with clear boundaries between observation and report.
Assessment
Clinical formulation
Move from a summary of facts to a reasoned, revisable understanding of the presentation.
Psychopathology
Perception and perceptual experiences
Clarify what was experienced before deciding how to describe it.
Psychopathology
Thought and speech
Separate the pace and organization of thinking from the ideas being expressed.
Psychopathology
Mood and affect
Describe sustained emotional experience and its expression during the encounter.
Psychopathology
Memory and cognition
Distinguish memory complaints, observed performance and everyday functioning.
Psychopathology
Consciousness and experience of self
Separate alertness and attention from experiences of detachment or unreality.
Psychopathology
Psychomotor phenomena
Observe movement, expression and activity without assigning a diagnosis from appearance.
Conditions
Depressive disorders: an educational overview
Understand the episode, its context and the information needed for a clinical assessment.
Conditions
Bipolar disorders: course and context
Recognize why an episode history matters more than the mood observed today.
Conditions
Psychotic disorders: describing the presentation
Examine experiences, functioning and cultural context before selecting a classification.
Conditions
Anxiety and fear-related disorders
Identify the focus of apprehension and its effect on everyday life.
Conditions
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Understand intrusive experiences, rituals, insight and functional burden.
Conditions
Trauma-related presentations
Distinguish an exposure history from the pattern of symptoms that follows it.
Conditions
Substance-use disorders: key distinctions
Separate exposure, acute effects and a longer-term pattern of impaired regulation.
Conditions
Neurocognitive presentations
Understand acquired change through cognition, course and daily functioning.
Learning
Principles of psychiatric classification
Use a classification to support careful reasoning, with its version and limits visible.
Learning
Psychopharmacology foundations
Connect molecular mechanisms with clinical questions while keeping their limits clear.
Learning
Psychological therapies: a foundation
Understand broad approaches, shared elements and the role of supervised assessment.
Learning
Case presentation and documentation
Make the clinical reasoning understandable to someone who did not conduct the interview.