Project Description

A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in psychiatry. A psychiatrist specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. Psychiatrists are medical doctors who must evaluate patients to determine whether or not their symptoms are the result of a physical illness, a combination of physical and mental, or a strictly psychiatric one. In order to do this, they may employ the psychiatric examination itself, a physical exam, brain imaging (computerized tomography or CT/CAT scan), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and positron emission tomography (PET) scanning), and blood laboratories. Psychiatrists prescribe medicine, and may also use psychotherapy, although the vast majority do medical management and refer to a psychologist or another specialized therapist for weekly to bi-monthly psychotherapy.

History

Some psychiatrists specialize in helping certain age groups. Child and adolescent (pediatric) psychiatrists work with kids and teenagers in addressing psychological problems, so that they are aware of the problem. Those who work with the elderly are called geriatric psychiatrists or geropsychiatrists.Those who practice psychiatry in the workplace are called organizational and occupational psychiatrists in the U.S. (occupational psychology is the name used for the most similar discipline in the UK).[1] Psychiatrists working in the courtroom and reporting to the judge and jury, in both criminal and civil court cases, are called forensic psychiatrists, who also treat mentally disordered offenders and other patients whose condition is such that they have to be treated in secure units.

Other psychiatrists and mental health professionals in the field of psychiatry may also specialize in psychopharmacology, psychotherapy, psychiatric genetics, neuroimaging, dementia-related disorders/ sicknesses as Alzheimer's disease, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, sleep medicine, pain medicine, palliative medicine, eating disorders, sexual disorders, women's health, Global Mental Health, early psychosis intervention, mood disorders and anxiety disorders (including obsessive-compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder).