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Question: Mental assessment
| Meghan
- Wed Jul 27, 2005 12:16 pm |
When a psychiatric patient is on a psych ward at the hospital what kind of tests / assessments would they do to determine if the person is mentally competant and stable to go for their first overnight pass/discahrge? Thank you ! Meghan
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| gr8psychrn
- Tue Aug 23, 2005 5:25 am |
Dear Meghan,
I'm not sure that there are any specific tests/assessments that are done on a psych. unit to determine if someone is stable enough to go on an overnight pass. It probably depends on lots of factors; what their behavior has been like on the unit, if they're suicidal or engaged in self harm, whether they're doing ok on meds or experiencing side effects, or using lots of prns, and what the social/support situation is like once they get home.
When you say "mentally competent", that is really a legal definition and there are specific assessments, evaluations, tests, etc. to determine if a person is "mentally competent". For example, this applies to one's ability to understand their illness, consent to treatment, make decisions re:their own health and finances, etc.
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