Mental Health and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner

Mental Health and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner

Mental Health and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner is an advanced specialty in nursing. It involves nurses who are certified to work with groups, communities, individuals, or families, assessing their health needs. Mental Health and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioners evaluate and diagnose patients with psychiatric disorders, provide psychotherapy and prescribe medication for them. They develop a plan of care, implement the nursing process, and evaluates it for effectiveness. Using their therapeutic skills, they treat patients with diagnosed disorders or with the potential risk factors that may cause a dysfunction such as family histories and other aspects.

Mental Health and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioners often work in correctional facilities, corporations, residential treatment facilities, public health agencies, psychiatric clinics, or pediatric clinics. They usually own private practices as well as serve as consultants for businesses, groups, or communities. Their duties in the various areas include assessing, diagnose, and treat mental health illnesses like dementia, substance abuse, depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and other risk factors or conditions. In providing diagnosis, they keep up with their holistic approach in educating and informing patients, their families about the mental health issues and steps to consider to boost their care..

The diagnosis requires Mental Health and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner to have excellent communication skills and the ability to relate with the patient for the practice to be effective. The steps involve recording a statement on the history of a patient through verbal communication, performing a physical exam, and ordering diagnostic tests. When the diagnosis is made, a treatment plan is developed by the nurse practitioner, prescribes the various medication, and administers psychotherapy.

My capstone project is on the prevention of dysfunctional behaviors among students with depression. Depression has become a significant problem in recent times and is the most common psychiatric disorder in the country, with many people suffering from dysfunctional behaviors associated with it. According to Gladstone et al. (2011), depression is one of the treatable disorders, but individuals still suffer from chronic illness and dysfunctional behaviors. This capstone project aims to review measures that promote mental health among students by preventing depression disorders.

An area of interest is on the various risk and prevention measures that are required for one to make crucial decisions when treating a student with dysfunctional behaviors associated with depression. There are different species, nonspecific, and resilience risk factors related to the prevention of depression. Specific risk factors are the factors that are associated with increasing dysfunctional behaviors such as low self-esteem, negative cognitive style, and low social support. The nonspecific risk factors include things like poverty, break up, and exposure to violence. Lastly, is the resilience factors such as peer relationship, skills in regulating emotion, and coping skills. The prevention measures and programs on depression will also be an area of interest as it includes school-based programs, cognitive-behavioral, and family based programs (Gladstone et al. 2011).

These areas of interest are essential because most of the students do not receive treatment for dysfunctional behaviors associated with depression. In many schools, there are no programs or risk factors that are considered when treating dysfunctional behaviors. Preventing these disorders by having the necessary programs and assessing the risk factors is of the essence. This is because it will help in preventing the development of the illness since it is challenging to treat once it has developed. With the high cost of depression among the students, we need to pay attention to the prevention measures concerning dysfunctional behaviors that are associated with depression.

Reference

Gladstone, T. R., Beardslee, W. R., & O’Connor, E. E. (2011). The prevention of adolescent depression. Psychiatric Clinics, 34(1), 35-52.