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Diagnosing Major Depressive Disorder (Case Review)

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Working With a Suicidal Client

Individuals diagnosed with depressive disorders and bipolar and related disorders are at risk for attempting and committing suicide. Therefore, it is important to accurately assess a client's risk for suicidal and/or homicidal tendencies. To maintain a high level of care and plan appropriate treatment, you should always consider the risk of suicide/homicide in clients with depressive disorders and bipolar and related disorders. This is true even when a client does not routinely entertain thoughts of suicide/homicide or when such issues are not the specific focus of the counseling session.

To prepare:

•Review this week's Learning Resources.

•Focus on one of 3 cases ("A Successful 'Total Failure'", "Connie" or "Roller Coaster") in Chapter 7 of the text.
•Consider the client's potential risk for suicide/homicide.

With these thoughts in mind:

Post by Day 4 a brief summary of one of 3 cases mentioned above. Construct and explain your diagnosis. Identify which disorders you would want to rule out. Explain what potential risks for suicide/homicide may be present with this client and how you would make this determination. Explain your recommendations for treatment, ongoing assessment, and follow-up with the client. Explain any challenges that might occur and how you might address them.

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Solution Summary

The solution provides information, assistance and advise in tackling the task (see above) on the topic of doing a diagnosis/case review with a likely result of major depressive disorder (MDD).. treatment is also suggested. Resources are listed for further exploration f the topic.

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MDD: Connie's Case

Connie is a 33-year old mother of a 4-year old boy named Robert. In the 3 months since she separated from her husband, she has lost a lot of weight, is pale, thin and has low appetite and even lower moods. She also experience sleeping problems, often waking up at 5 am and finding it difficult to get back to sleep. Her ex-husband, Donald, had subjected her to abuse both physical and mental. In their first year of marriage, he became irritable and critical of Connie. He also made it so that she was forced to cut off communications from her family, friends and colleagues at work. Prior to marrying Donald, she was a happy and active woman. In high school she was popular as a cheerleader. She also enjoyed very close relationships with family and friends and had a great relationship with her parents. Connie acknowledged Donald's behavior but went ahead with her pregnancy in their first year together. At her 7th month of pregnancy, Donald began complaining and started to hit her with his fists; to escape she went to stay with her parents for a week but after a remorse Donald came to ask her to come back to their apartment, she went. While it was peaceful for a time, after she gave birth, Donald became violent again. Almost every weekend he would consume cocaine which sent him to fits of violence, bruising and battering Connie. Enduring almost 4 more years of violence and domestic abuse in the hands of Donald, she finally left him 3 months previous. She however blames herself for his 'cocaine use', seeing herself as ...

Solution provided by:
Xenia Rochelle Jones, MA, PhD (IP)
Education
  • MPhil/PhD (IP), Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
  • MA, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
  • Certificate, Geva Ulpan (via Universita Tel Aviv)
  • BA, University of the Philippines
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