Psychiatric Examination

The paper presents the background, conditions and procedures for psychiatric evaluation, along with its individual components, with the intention to provide medical students with some basic guidelines on how to do it. The external and internal factors which affect psy­chiatric evaluation are described. The core of the paper consists of sections addressing the two key parts of psychiatric evaluation: psychiatric history and assessment of the patient’s mental status. Their components, definitions and relevant clinical examples are described in detail.