Sophie Miles

Respond to at least two of your colleagues’ postings in one or more of the following ways:

· Offer polite agreement or disagreement with a difference, and explain your stance.

· Offer a limitation of administration of an addictions assessment tool instead of a general clinical tool.

· Expand on your colleague’s posting.

There are two post here that needs a reply

1. Clinical assessment is used to collect information to conclude the use of measurements, psychological tests, neurological tests, and interviews to determine what a client or patient's problem is and the symptoms they're showing. A mental health specialist must first engage with the client to ensure the treatments selected for the client work. To do this, the mental health professional must take the clinical assessment approach (Bridley et al., 2018). The information collected from clients includes discovering the client's experiences, strengths, character, attributes, cognitive and emotional functioning, social context, environmental stressors, and cultural factors appropriate to them, such as their language or ethnicity (Bridley et al., 2018). Some of the tools used for the screenings are ASUS, AUDIT, CAGE, CRAFFT, MAST, CAPS-r, and so on. CAPS-r. Also, these tests were used on college students (Larimer et al., 2004).

Addictions assessment tools are tests used by counselors to determine the type and severity of a client's addiction. Addictions assessment determines the nature of the clients' condition, the diagnosis and assists with developing the specific treatments recommended to address the clients' problems and their diagnosis (U.S. National Library of Medicine, 1970). Also, the assessment helps with the counselor's decision-making and enables them to track their patients' progress. Unlike the clinical evaluation, the addiction assessment comes in different forms. Whichever method a counselor chooses to use for their client helps understand a client's situation, diagnose, and treat them. Some of the tools used here are CAAPE, CIDI V1.1, GAIN-I, SCID, and so on. These tools help determine the nature and extent of the substance abuse issues (Screening and Assessment Tools for Substance Use Disorders, n.d).

Both screening and addiction assessments have essential tools that can be used both. The screenings help to answer the questions, is there a substance abuse issue? What is the immediacy of the problem?. Whereas the addiction assessment helps to determine the type of and extent of the substance abuse problem. 

                                                                                                                   References

Bridley, A., W., L., & Jr., D. (2018, January 5). Essentials of Abnormal Psychology. https://opentext.wsu.edu/abnormalpsychology/chapter/3-1-clinical-assessment/. 

Larimer, M. E., Cronce, J. M., Lee, C. M., & Kilmer, J. R. (n.d.). JavaScript required. Sign In. https://web-a-ebscohost-com.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=82a513c9-44aa-4fb7-aa5f-bee291630fc2%40sdc-v-sessmgr03. 

U.S. National Library of Medicine. (1970, January 1). Chapter 4: Screening and Assessment. Substance Abuse Treatment: Addressing the Specific Needs of Women. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK83253/. 

SAMHSA. (n.d.). Examples of Screening and Assessment Tools for Substance Use Disorders. https://ncsacw.samhsa.gov/files/SAFERR_AppendixD.pdf. 

2. In research, the use of an appropriate assessment instrument can make the difference between a null and a significant finding. (Samet et al., 2007) This statement is true in many fields of work, including addictions treatment and the use of addictions assessments and clinical assessments. It is important to use the right assessment tool in order to get the best assessment on your individual client.

In an example by Dr. A Thomas McLellan, of a physician who is severely physiological addicted to opiates and a young woman with a milder physiological addiction, reveals that with an assessment that focuses narrowly on drug abuse history the assessment would stop there, providing the impression that the physician may have a greater challenge with recovery. That assessment did not take into consideration the biopsychosocial history of the client which may have revealed a strong social support system and self-sufficiency of one client while the other may be jobless and without social support.

Some addictions assessment tools are self-administered, while they can also be adminstered by a psychologist or addictions professional. It allows for the individual to do their own screening which can alter the outcome. For example, with the NIDA Drug Screening Tool NIDA-Modified ASSIST (NM ASSIST) can be self-administered and is a brief 4 questions that refers to the frequency of Alcohol, Tobacco Products Prescription Drugs for Non-Medical Reasons, and illegal drugs. It then provides a response such as “Patient is at risk for prescription drugs/illegal drugs” and/or “Patient is an at-risk drinker. One or more days of heavy drinking.” This assessment does not look into the history of the individual or screen for other co-occurring disorders. (Smith et al. 2010) The American Psychiatric Association has also adapted several assessment tools to be self-administered by the individual for no clinical evaluations.

Comprehensive Addictions and Psychological Evaluation-5 (CAAPE-5) is a comprehensive diagnostic assessment interview which provides documentation for substance-specific diagnoses based on DSM5 criteria, and is done as a clinical assessment. It provides insight into a consistent and efficient DSM‐5 compatible diagnostic interview, documentation of drug and/ or alcohol related problems, indications of common mental health conditions, and demographic and clinical prognostic indicators. (Hoffmann, N.)

References

Samset, S., Waxman, R., Hatzenbuehler, M., & Hasin, D. S. (2007). Assessing addiction: Concepts and instruments. Addiction Science & Clinical Practice, 4(1), 19-31. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2797097/pdf/ascp-04-01-19.pdf

Smith PC, Schmidt SM, Allensworth-Davies D, Saitz R. A Single-Question Screening Test for Drug Use in Primary Care. Arch Intern Med. 2010;170(13):1155–1160. doi:10.1001/archinternmed.2010.140

Norman G. Hoffmann. Comprehensive Addictions and   Psychological Evaluation ‐ 5. Retrieved from CAAPE5description.pdf (evinceassessment.com)