A term psychiatric emergency can be used to express an acute disturbance in behavior, thinking process, mood, or social relationships that require immediate and special intervention as defined by the family of the patient or the patient himself.
Some families may have a tough time identifying a psychiatric emergency. A psychiatric emergency can be a dangerous or, in some cases, a life-threatening situation in which the patient needs immediate attention.
What are the risks associated with a psychiatric emergency?
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In some cases, a psychiatric emergency can bring various types of risks for both the patients and their family and friends. Some of those can be:
- Searching online or from others about the ways to perform suicide
- Saying sometimes that they want to harm or kill themselves
- Writing a suicide note
- Hurting themselves in order to die
- Preparing to kill themselves like making a noose, buying sleeping pills, or getting weapons
- Making a will or distributing favorite belongings
- Wanting or planning to kill a specific person
- Seeing things that are not present or acting paranoid
- Harming animals or destroying properties
- Acting violently towards others without any reason etc.
In all of these cases, emergency help or treatment may be required. Thus contacting a doctor or a psychiatrist to find out the actual problem is the best way to get help.
Is suicidal tendency a psychiatric emergency?
If you are someone that has constant and strong suicidal thoughts or tendencies, you need to seek medical attention as soon as possible. Do not neglect these feelings or think that these feelings will go away after some time.
There are various experts or doctors who can help you with such suicidal feelings or thoughts. If you ignore these feelings and continue your life as if it’s nothing to be concerned about, there is great potential that you may really hurt yourself or your near and dear ones without even knowing the seriousness of your actions.
Relation between depression and mental illness
Clinical depression has a strong link with other types of mental illness, like, panic disorder, anxiety disorder, social phobia, and many more. However, thanks to the powerful and enhanced medical science, these disorders are treatable with the help of an expert doctor and their powerful knowledge regarding medical science.
Can proper and timely care treat depression?
Most severe depression is treatable. So, if you are facing the problems of depression, don’t hesitate; just consult an expert as soon as possible.
Treatments of psychiatric emergency
Treatment of psychiatric issues depends on the types of psychiatric emergencies that a patient displays. A psychiatrist can do a psychiatric emergency evaluation that is really effective and thus can suggest the perfect process of treatment for each case.
Initial evaluation of a psychiatric emergency requires the collection of all information about the mental situation and history of a patient. The initial evaluation includes taking some notes about the mental state of the patient. The psychiatrist will perform some things to find out. Some of those things are:
Changes in behavior and speech: Are there signs of over-breathing or is the patient acting hostile or suspicious, if they look like they are muttering things to themselves, if their speech is incoherent, all of these instances display that it is a case of a medical emergency more often than not.
Mood swings: If the patient shows symptoms of anxiety or depression. Typically, the treatments under the management of psychiatric emergencies are aimed at stabilizing the ongoing threatening conditions.
After the condition of the patient is stabilized, they are checked and transferred to a special ward for the proper psychiatric rehabilitation.
Thus, a psychiatric emergency should be treated as soon as possible to live a healthy and happy life for a long period of time.
