Risk Management

A therapeutic alliance can serve to build a trusting relationship between clinician and patient and increase the patient’s feelings of agency and autonomy.

For now, it is encouraging to know that psychiatrists remember that they, too, are physicians first who can tap into their medical training to provide comprehensive patient care.

The presence of a psychiatric diagnosis does not necessarily indicate lack of decisional capacity.

This article explains and demonstrates the importance of psychiatric advance directives and the benefits and obstacles involved in implementing them.

American psychiatrists might be able to sympathize in the wake of recent mass tragedies leading to new, hastily conceived laws that directly impinge on psychiatric practice, confidentiality, and duty to protect third parties.

On December 18, 2012, French psychiatrist Daniele Canarelli, age 58, received a 1-year suspended prison sentence by the Criminal Court of Marseille after one of her patients killed someone.

Both clinicians and weather forecasters employ the same general process of information gathering, analysis, and reaching a conclusion.

Can patient care still be your greatest concern, given today’s litigious landscape? Does patient-focused care need to take a back seat against protecting yourself from malpractice?

What steps should you take to avoid being sued? The answer to this all important question can be heard in this video, which stars Skip Simpson, a nationally recognized attorney who has spent his career litigating medical malpractice case

Clinical tools and intervention options are available to the psychiatrist treating the suicidal patient. The severity of the patient’s psychiatric condition and the clinician’s experience and training will determine the interventions.

The California Supreme Court’s decision in the Tarasoff case over 30 years ago has become a standard part of mental health practice. This case influenced the legal requirements governing therapists’ duty to protect third parties in nearly every state in the US.

Cases that come to our attention as malpractice claims, ethics claims, or Board of Registration complaints raise the question: why did the treating clinician not terminate the treatment before things got so out of hand?

In treating a female who sexually abuses a minor, what should the clinician keep in mind? Is the treatment plan different for a female offender than a male?

Insight can be assessed in the course of a typical evaluation or follow-up interview with augmentation by questions borrowed from any of the validated insight rating scales.

Being a psychotherapist is a complicated job. Not only must you be knowledgeable about human behavior, psychodynamics, and various techniques of doing therapy, but you have to be prepared for unexpected dilemmas.

Mrs E, who is 80 years old, lives in the community with the help of a 24-hour-a-day home health aide. She is forgetful and requires assistance with many activities of daily living.

Here we present how to assess safely patients who become oppositional or menacing in a clinic or office.

A history of trauma is most uniquely related to which psychiatric disorder? Which medical comorbidities are associated with an increased risk of suicide in older adults? These questions and more.

Here we address some of these problems of meaningless phrasing, empty shells, and template-distorted recording in an attempt to improve clinical documentation for both clinical care and risk management.

In this podcast, Dr Thomas Gutheil talks about a key challenge facing psychiatrists. . . valid medical record keeping. Here: important tips from an expert based on an article he coathored with Dr Robert Simon.

The purpose of suicide risk assessment is to identify treatable and modifiable risks and protective factors that inform the patient’s treatment and safety management requirements.

New technologies pose challenges in the need to maintain boundaries and confidentiality. The same boundaries and ethical standards that existed in the 20th century must be thoughtfully applied with all new and developing technologies of the 21st century.

Might your patient be feigning mental illness? Forensic psychiatrist Phillip Resnick, MD offers insights.

What should clinicians do if they realize that they don’t like a particular patient who has come to them for help

The psychiatric emergency room (ER) is an intense, stressful work environment where psychiatrists must perform rapid assessments and make swift treatment decisions.