My-Anh Doan PSYCHOLOGICAL REPORT This is a CONFIDENTIAL report that is intended to be used by professionals. It is not to be passed on to others without the permission of the author and the client. The results are not to be released to the client without the permission of the author or other professional trained in the interpretation of neuropsychological test data. IDENTIFICATION AND REFERRAL: THEODORE TWOMBLY is a 41-year-old English-speaking LA-native divorced white male who was self-referred for a psychological assessment with respect to differential diagnosis. History (Origin/Ethnic/Cultural/Language/Family/Education/Migration Background/ Employment): MR. TWOMBLY was born in and raised in LA and was an only child. He states that he …show more content…
He does not own a car. Housekeeping: He performs house chores on his own after his divorce with his wife. Finances and Money Management: He is in charge of his own finances and is financially responsible. He would occasionally consult with SAMANTHA about certain decisions if he was unsure about something. Medication and Health Care Management: Does not take any medication but would have most likely rely on SAMANTHA for reminders had they been still together. Family Relations: He lives alone but is in contact with his parents who live on the East Coast. Before living alone, he used to live with his OS-girlfriend; and before that, he used to live together with his ex-wife. When describing his relationship with his ex-wife before the divorce, he stated that “they were big influences on each other.” When asked about the cause of the divorce, he stated that it was most likely because “he’d be upset about something and not be able to say it…and [Catherine would] sense that there was something wrong, but he’d deny it.” He describes his more recent relationship with SAMANTHA favorably but also mentions how distressed and panicked he was when he thought that SAMANTHA had left him after an argument one day. He states that he ran around the city to look for SAMANTHA, not paying attention to his surrounding or others. When discussing the reason for his latest breakup, he said that SAMANTHA had been talking to other people while being in a relationship …show more content…
TWOMBLY presents with depressed mood most of the day, nearly every day for at least a year as indicated by his self-reports and the reports of INFORMANT #1. He also reports having a markedly diminished interest or pleasure in almost all activities that he previously enjoyed prior to his divorce nearly every day. When he tries to do other activities in an attempt to revive his pleasure, he finds that he is still unable to enjoy the activity. He reports feelings of emptiness nearly every day. In addition, he reports having low energy every day, but he attributes that to the fact that he has not been able to sleep well nearly every night. He reports feeling like his writing as a professional writer isn’t adequate and reports being occasionally distracted during the work day nearly every day, but not enough that his functioning at work is affected. Altogether, his symptoms have made it difficult for him to maintain normal social functioning, as indicated by his self-reports and reports from INFORMANT #1; he has not been socializing with his friends or coworkers and instead has been secluding himself. MR. TWOMBLY reports no history of any medical condition, psychotic disorder, or substance use as well as no history of having a manic or hypomanic episode. The aforementioned symptoms are in excess of the required number of symptoms to make a diagnosis of major depressive disorder but are manageable and result in a minor impairment in social and occupational function, thus it is
Michael is a 56 year old male who lives alone in a small tin shed in the middle of the bush in central Queensland. He has no children, no partner and lives by himself. During the day he spends his time sleeping on the couch or doing chores around the property. If he isn’t asleep, he requires a stimuli to remain occupied. When he was a young boy, he was a very calm child with a great sense of humour. His physical health was perfect with good energy levels. When he was sexually abused at the age of 8, by his grandfather, these characteristics started to change. From the age of 16 he was having regular breakdowns in his thinking and emotional responses. Michael was constantly feeling irritable and having trouble sleeping with frequent nightmares. As the years went by his attitude was extremely negative which led on to him being withdrawn from his family and friends. During his last year of high school, he started to regularly use marijuana. He would experience countless amounts of paranoia episodes where he would hear voices and thought he was being spied on. At the age of 45 he was fin...
Peter Dickinson, a 28-year-old Caucasian male was referred to an outpatient mental health clinic by his current girlfriend of one year, Ashley. Ashley reported that about six months ago, she noticed changes in Peter’s behaviors after the announcement of his parents’ divorce proceedings. Peter is a motivated hard worker who devotes himself to his career and is currently working as a defense attorney at a small firm. However, he described himself as “obsessive” about his work in which he was afraid to make errors and would spend a lot of time worrying about failing the assignment rather than completing it. Since he spends a lot of time worrying about his work, he had little leisure time for friends and romantic relationships. Peter has also always felt anxious and is a “worrier”. After Peter’s parents’ divorce proceedings began, Peter had troubl...
Kaplan, H. I., Sadock, B. J., & Grebb, J. A. (1994). Synopsis of psychiatry: behavioral sciences,
Weisman, M.M., Livingston, B.M., Leaf, P.J., Florio, L.P., Holzer, C. (1991). Psychiatric Disorders in America. Affective Disorders. Free Press.
Monitoring of Joe’s daily status is important to establish his status quo throughout the week when he is not in his therapist’s office. Keeping a journal of his thoughts and feelings, noting them as they change, will help his therapist to assess his mood variations, thoughts and feelings during the day to day stresses of life, including any physical complaints from which he suffered (Disner, S. G., Beevers, C. G., Haigh, E. P., & Beck, A. T., 2011). This will assist the therapist in monitoring Joe’s status when he or she is not with him, as well as any thinking bias, psychosomatic complaints, erratic mood fluctuations, and monitor any medication therapy for any signs of non-compliance, abuse, or side effects, as well as note any positive results from his treatment plan. Short-term goals should be set with Joe, as well as a couple of long-term goals to work toward during his treatment. This will keep Joe focused on the goals at hand, which will result in positive results when he meets said goals. This is part of the cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), as it will show him that he is not a failure, he can take the initiative to meet his goals, and the world is not against him. According to Auerbach et al. (2013), “Depressed individuals are more sensitive to negative stimuli (e.g. job loss) and less responsive to positive stimuli”, complicating the treatment of a depressed individual; moreover, Joe does not appear to have any positive incentives at first glance but the
Scott met Laci when they were both attending California Polytechnic State University in 1994. They dated for a while then decided to move in together and get married in 1997. They moved to Modesto, CA to be closer to Laci’s family where Scott spent his days selling fertilizer and Laci as a substitute teacher. Laci found out she was pregnant in 2002 with Scott’s baby but Scott was not so thrilled. Scott felt overwhelmed and that a baby would cramp his style. In the midst of what was going on at home Scott was looking for an outlet that didn’t remind him of home and started ha...
Katon, W., and Sullivan, M. D., (1990) Depression and Chronic Mental Illness. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, v.51. pgs. 8-19
Kahn, Ada P., and Jan Fawcett. The Encyclopedia of Mental Health. 2nd ed. New York: Facts On File, 2001.
Before proceeding with the review of this article we should first be clear with the meaning of the term forensic neuropsychology. Forensic neuropsychology involves the evaluation of subjects by application of clinical neuropsychological assessment methods. This particular branch of forensic science plays a key role when it comes to evaluating the criminal competency of an individual to stand trial, insanity defences, diminished criminal responsibility, criminal mitigation, etc. A neuropsychological evaluation is an assessment of the cognitive and behavioural functions using a set of standardized tests and procedures, professionals call these sets of tests or procedures as a battery of test. Various mental functions are systematically tested, including, but not limited to:
Depression is well known for its mental or emotional symptoms. Symptoms for depression include: persistently sad or unhappy mood, loss of interest or pleasure in previously enjoyable activities, difficulty concentrating, remembering, making decisions, anxiety, feelings of guilt, worthlessness, helplessness, and thoughts of death or dying. “People who have endured a major depressive episode describe the experience as a descent into t...
Stuss and colleagues (2002) argue that clinical neuropsychology at its simplest is “the understanding of brain-behaviour links and their applications to clinical situations”. In their review of the history of clinical neuropsychology, they speak of three fields that have contributed to our current understanding of brain behaviour links including 1) behavioural neurology, 2) neuropsychiatry and 3) clinical neuropsychology. Within these disciplines, a range of techniques are used to investigate loca...
Sullivan, S. J., Hammond-Tooke, G. D., Schneiders, A. G., Gray, A. R., & McCrory, P. (2012). The diagnostic accuracy of selected neurological tests. Journal of Clinical Neuroscience, 19. 423-427. doi:10.1016/j.jocn.2011.09.011
Sam is a 60 year old, retired prison guard who was diagnosed with depression at the age of 56. Sam felt that all his life he struggled with hopelessness, but never felt the need to seek out any professional support other than his family. Sam stated, “I would feel down on myself, but never put much thought into it.” Sam’s first involvement with psychiatric services came shortly after the death of his son. Sam relayed that this was a difficult time for him. He was forced to retire due to a medical condition, his youngest daughter had started her own family and then tragedy stuck Sam’s oldest child and only son committed suicide. Sam stated that he felt that his world had just ended and he himself could not find any reason to live. Sam noted that he became angry and would avoid any contacts with his family. He even contemplated leaving his wife, whom he was happily married to for 35 years. Sam explained that he simply gave up, he stopped watching his diet, he started smoking again after giving it up for 10 years and he would often not get out of bed for days. One could surmise that Sam had entered a state of stagnation. He had lost so much that he isolated himself, gave up on his future and due to these feelings it placed him in a state of stagnation (Van Hiel, Mervielde, & de Fruyt, 2006). Sam’s medical doctor had noted several changes in his demeanor,
It was determined during therapy session that Fran suffers from a mental disorder of depression, which has emerged from irritable moods, feeling hopelessness, worthlessness and at the times problem sleeping. “Depression is a mood disorder characterized by pervasive feelings of sadness, worthlessness, helplessness, hopelessness, irritability, and lack of interest in everyday activities and events, as well as physical symptoms” (2011, F. Wang, M. DesMeules, W. Luo, S. Dai, C. Lagace & H. Morrison, p. 206). Fran reports the symptoms started after experiencing financial difficulties and increased after losing her children. Tom often isolates himself to try to avoid family conflict. His action often increases Fran symptoms of depressions. Neither Tom nor Fran is employed and struggles to manage their family savings to pay monthly expensive.
Personality is an individual’s characteristic pattern of feeling, thinking and acting. Psychodynamic theories of personality view human behavior as a dynamic interaction between the conscious mind and unconscious mind, including associated motives and conflicts (Myers & Dewall, pg# 572, 2015). These theories focus on the unconscious and the importance of childhood experiences. Psychodynamic theories are descended from Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis, which is his ideology of personality and the associated treatment techniques. Psychoanalysis attributes thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflicts. This theory also includes the techniques used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions. He proposed that childhood sexuality and unconscious motivations influence personality. Freud’s historically significant psychoanalytic theory became part of the human cultural legacy.