What is a psychiatric evaluation? It is done by a psychiatrist who is a physician with special psychiatry training (courses and residencies). This evaluation is comprehensive but medical in nature. Expect the person to ask for your physical, behavioral, and cognitive histories, order blood tests or other medical exams, evaluate (by observation and interview) your mood, your reality testing, and mental status etc. Ultimately, after an extensive (and usually expensive) interview, the doctor will arrive at a psychiatric diagnosis (if appropriate) and may also recommend medicines to help with the problem–which they can prescribe. A few also provide ongoing talk therapy but most do not. Rather, they recommend you find a therapist for that part. They will follow up with med checks as needed to titrate or refine your medicines. When a person has a very difficult, complex, or lengthy history of mental health, or, when the person is needing a diagnosis for legal reasons, a psychiatrist is a good choice. They are usually gifted at extracting subtle physical and behavioral matters that may help correctly pinpoint the problem. While a person might well get anti-depressants from their regular doctor, a good psychiatrist is better able to deal with complex matters and follow you more closely to get the right compound and dosage.
Psychological Evaluation, AKA testing, psych assessment. These are offered, mostly, by doctoral level psychologists. These evaluations will cover much of the same history, mental status, and provide diagnoses when appropriate. Interviews, just like the previous two options, are essential. However, what sets psychological evaluation apart is its use of standardized tests. These may be paper and pencil or electronic. They may be filled out by the client or by family members. The results provide a snapshot of behavior, or cognitive functioning, or mood by contrasting the individual results against a peer group. For example, a child may complete a computerized test to assess attention span. The results are compared to thousands of children taking this test who either are “non ADHD” and or ADHD. A good psychologist collects data from multiple data points (test data, interviews by client and maybe family, observations, etc.) and uses that data to make interpretations and recommendations for ongoing care. Usually, the best psychological evaluations begin with a very objective, specific question. Just throwing a bunch of tests at a person to “see what comes up” isn’t all that helpful. Just because something pops up doesn’t mean it is meaningful.
It is true that masters level therapists (licensed or not) give and interpret some tests. But most of the best tests can only be given and interpreted by doctoral level, licensed psychologists.
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