Assessing The Whole Person The practice of counseling is associated with assessment and diagnosis and is indispensable for designing treatment. In some approaches, a comprehensive evaluation of the client is the initial footprint of the healing process. Regardless of a therapist theoretical orientation, they must employ an assessment of the whole person, which is an ongoing part of the healing process (Hutchinson, 2015). Furthermore, evaluating the whole person can help in recognizing the importance of the issue of culture when diagnosing and designing a treatment (Alcantara & Gone, 2014). Thus, evaluating the whole self can reveal an individual's memory, values, cognitive development, and helplessness. …show more content…
Montague (2013) says these are not various personalities that we in some sense embody, they are facets of our individuality. Thereby, becoming the wholeness of a person's thoughts and values that develops one’s ego (Montague, 2013). When one component of an individual’s wholeness changes, it causes an unbalanced in one’s thinking, mood, and behavior affecting one’s mental status. Magolda, Creamer, and Meszaros (2010) call this the process of the mind’s power to treat and communicate one’s emotions, it touches the external response concerning the inner portion of the psyche. Therefore, using a mental status exam moves beyond self-composition, opening doors to how people think about the universe and how they survive. Influence of The Mental Status Exam in Therapy The control of the mental status examination in therapy can be either structured or unstructured in obtaining crucial clinical information about a client's behavior and cognitive performance. In my interview, I took an informal approach, using open-ended questions, since my client was in her 70’s. The mental status examination helped in identifying a couple of issues. The first issue, irrational thoughts of my client, for instance, thoughts stuck in her mind, always puzzling over a problem with a person at work. The irrational behavior in solving the problem, “she would approach the person instead of going to her supervisor” my responds to the issue “what would be the consequence of you doing that?” silence, becoming a thought-stopping moment (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2014). The second issue, asking the client: “what would she do if a person who was much bigger than she tried to pick a fight with her” (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2014). She replied “I would attempt to …show more content…
Therefore, it is critical to choose the right mental status examination of the population one is serving. For that reason, I should have used the mini-mental status review with my client to gather information if there was a change in cognitive functioning. What I have learned, maintaining sensitivity and respect of another will enhance the healing relationship. As a result of this practice, I held an intelligent conversation with the client, offered an understanding of how the mental status examination operates, and how information gained can help in decision-making. Also demonstrating flexibility and eagerness to accept mistakes in my own thinking and the ability to prepare recommendations for