Depression is a common psychiatric disorder in children, adolescents, adults, and the elderly. Primary care providers, not mental health professionals, treat the majority of patients with symptoms of depression. Persons who are depressed have feelings of sadness, loneliness, irritability, worthlessness, hopelessness, agitation, and guilt that may be accompanied by an array of physical symptoms as well as substance abuse. Identifying patients with depression and substance abuse can be difficult in busy primary care settings where time is limited, but certain depression/substance abuse screening tools may help diagnose the disorder.

Discuss a screening tool that can be used in the primary care setting that can help with the identification of patients with depression and or substance abuse. What is your responsibility as a primary care provider to this patient once a disorder has been identified?

Answer preview

Depression is one of the fastest growing health concerns within the society we live in. The rapid growth of this mental condition endangers more lives each and every other day. To curb the impact of depression which is spread out among children, adolescents and adults alike, its establishment is of the essence. In primary care centers, Primary care providers interact with cases of depression on many levels. Primary care centers are however busy places that cannot focus on the identification of such conditions through the individual interactions with patients (Park, & Zarate, 2019). To highlight the instances of depression the institutions need to use depression screening tools to diagnose the health condition. One such relevant tool is the Self Reporting Questionnaire. This questionnaire helps in the diagnosis of depression using various questions that place the…

 

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