What happens when you first see a psychiatrist?

When a person is referred to see a psychiatrist or directly look for one, the professional should carefully assess the person, and this means to get health records and gather all necessary information about that individual's health and personal history to know and understand their current mental health situation, based on which the person should be referred to get testing, to other medical professionals, for further evaluation or treatment. In case the psychiatrist identified a mental health disorder of psychological nature, they should refer the person for treatment to a psychotherapist, and in case the person is undergoing a serious condition causing suicidal, homicidal, violent or dysfunctional behavior/risk, the psychiatrist should directly discuss the pros and cons of using psychotropic drugs, for the person to consider using them to prevent any further risky or destructive behavior from happening, while beign referred for testing to make sure those drugs will not be fatal or seriously damage the person's health more than expected because of their adverse effects, and also get a referral for treatment right away.

Unhappily most times this would not happen, the psychiatrist could spend a few minutes asking general questions, then implement a brief psychiatric assessment to identify what they could consider a psychiatrist condition, and most probably immediately prescribe psychotropic drugs without necessary testing, without discussing with the person the pros and cons of using such drugs, telling patients they are their treatment, and disregardign treatment. This way the person would believe psychotropic drugs are their treatment, use them ignoring the adverse effects, and not receive a referral for treatment of their mental health disorders.

Many times people seeing a psychiatrist have already used psychotropic drugs prescribed by their PCP -primary care physicians, using a similar approach, just with a superficial knowledge of mental health and of psychotropic drugs.

You could try telling them your issues, but most times they would focus on identifying symptoms that could justify a diagnosis to prescribe psychotropic drugs. then the person should not expect a psychiatrist to carefully listen to them, taking a long time to understand them, nor to provide any significant psychologial=cal/psychotherapeutic support.

After that initial evaluation, most times psychiatrits would see people for around five minutes to basically continue prescribing/adjusting psychotropic drugs. Thus there is no psychological treatment or significant counseling of any kind.

Hello. I wonder if you read my response and if it answered your question.

Hello. I hope you could read my last response. Please feel free to contact me if you have any further questions or to follow up, since I am here willing and ready to support you as much as possible. Please remember to rate support/answer, otherwise, the website will keep your payment but not compensate me for the work and time invested in answering your question.

Thank you,

Rafael