Handling Mental Health Disorders: Chung, A Case Study

Running Head: CHUNG
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Handling mental health disorders; Chung, A Case Study
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

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CHUNG
Urgent health risk of suicide
A high priority and urgent mental health risk area that faces Chung is suicide.
Prolonged depression can lead to suicidal thoughts. Chung experiences pressure at work and
feels that he is neglecting his daughter and wife. He has a perception of the mental health
condition as self-induced and believes that there is no treatment that can help. He views
suicide as his escape route.
Intervention
Suicidal thoughts have crossed his mind for the last week and he is conscious of high
lethality prescriptions that he can take above their dosages to put his life to an end. The
hospital is therefore risky place for him to be because he can access lethal medication which
he will use to end his life. An effective intervention is advising Chung to stay at home for
some days. This lessens access to suicidal means (Zalsman et al., 2016).
Chung feels that treatment may not help him and due to this it can be difficult to
convince him to see a therapist. The nurse can apply the talk therapy first before Chung sees a
specialist. This will help him ‘face and master his own emotions’ (Bowers, 2012).The nurse
should ‘talk in a supportive and non-judgemental way’ to Chung (American Psychological
Association, 2018).Talking about how we feel makes us view things differently.
Persistent low mood
Prolonged stressful life experiences can lead to the development of mental health
disorders unhealthy (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). According to Silvaa,
Loureiro and Cardoso (2016), anxiety and depression are examples of mental disorders. They
further explain that mental wellbeing is influenced by the individual attributes, the
socioeconomic circumstances and the environment. Chung is depressed due to his stressful
daily environment at home and work. He works for long hours thus has difficulties balancing
his family and career life. Legg (2017) mentions the symptoms of depression as hopelessness,
loss of interest, changes in appetite and weight, increased fatigue, sleep problems and
anxiety. Some symptoms of anxiety are restlessness, rapid heart rate and breathing (Legg,
2017).
Chung has been sleepless for the past six weeks but still works at night and could go
for over 20 hours without sleep. He has a feeling that the condition is self-inflicted and
believes there is no cure; a sign of hopelessness (Pollard, 2018). He has lost five kilograms of
weight during the past month, due to reduced appetite and missing meals. Chung states his
desire to end his life.