CASE STUDY ASSIGNMENT #1
Case Study Assignment #1
Najah Blassingame
Department of Counselor Education and Family Studies
CEFS 546: Psychopathology
Liberty University
Author Note
Department of Counselor Education and Family Studies, Liberty University
I have no known conflict of interest to disclose.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Najah Blassingame
Email: nblasingame@liberty.edu
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CASE STUDY ASSIGNMENT #12
Anna Case Study Assignment
Key Issues
Biological
Some of the biological issues that Anna has is that she is a widow who is a primary
caretaker of her 90-year-old mother. Her parents immigrated to the United States two years prior
to her birth. She holds many Asian traditions such as not bringing shame upon her family by
placing her mother in a nursing home. She never experienced food poisoning or any traumatic
injuries.
Psychological
Anna has retired from working as a full-time elementary teacher three years ago. She
struggled with anxiety ever since her retirement. Currently, she does not feel sad about it, but she
worries about finances. Her husband left her with a significant amount of money when he died,
and she has a retirement account. She has been drinking wine prior to her husband’s death and
she believes her consumption is not a problem. She has been taking Paxil for her anxiety for four
weeks and suffers from menopause.
Social
Her husband died two years prior from being diagnosed with cancer. She cried a lot after
her husband died. She has three adult children but her oldest daughter stays in touch with her.
She misses her coworkers, and she only has kept in touch with two friends. She spends time
caring for her mother and helping her daughter with her grandchildren. She is worried she will
die alone without no one around her.
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Spiritual
Anna’s religion is labeled as Hindu, and she is interested in integrating her religion
practices into her counseling process. She is very committed to her religion and she values
family and relationships. She believes that her wake up call was her children letting her know
that they do not want to be around her anymore.
Assessment
An assessment that would be used for diagnosing Anna would be the GAD-7. In the
Jordan et al., 2017 article, it defines this assessment tends to be an apprehension measure subject
to seven things which are scored from zero to three. The whole scale score can go from 0 to 21
and eliminate scores for mild, moderate, and severe anxiety type signs are 5, 10, and 15
independently.
Diagnostic Impressions
Primary Diagnosis - Generalized Anxiety Disorder (F41.1)
This disorder is difficult to control because of excessive worry and anxiety. Anna showed
signs of excessive anxiety and worry; irritability, muscle tension, and difficulty sleeping. She
showed excessive anxiety and worry by thinking of events that she never experienced. Her
irritability developed from her family confronting her about worrying. These signs have been
occurring for over 18 to 24 months. These signs caused Anna to have trouble focusing.
Secondary Diagnosis – Major Depressive Disorder, Recurrent Episode (Moderate : F33.1)
Anna showed signs of this disorder by feeling tense about things, difficulty concentrating
due to excessive worry and fear that something awful will happen. This disorder stuck out to me
because Anna was having a series of events in her mind that she never experienced. These events
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may never happen but most of the events or questions were awful thoughts. She constantly has
them in her mind, but they will not go away.
Treatment Recommendations
Irritability and Snapping
Anna has been snapping at her family because they are confronting her about her anxiety.
She is also getting irritable about the situation and her children do not want to talk to her. There
are many ways she can deal with her snapping and irritability. One way she can deal with this
issue is to stop and think about what she wants to say before saying it. She could also reduce the
use of alcohol intake because it can be a trigger to her irritable moods.
Worrying
Anna is having excessive worrying. She is constantly thinking about negative events that
could possibly happen. Anna could learn to replace her negative thinking with positive thinking
instead. Anna could try to mediate or try to do something that she enjoys doing to get her mind
off of worrying. Xu et al., 2017 indicated, that a couple of assessments have shown that care
planning can diminish the repeat of mind wandering and work on its tricky impact on execution
in generally speaking networks.
Specific Considerations
Cultural background plays an important role in this case because Anna is Asian American
woman that is loyal her culture’s traditions. She is very committed to taking care of her mother
and making she is not placed in a nursing home. I would need to learn more about the Asian
culture and the religion of Hinduism. The value conflicts that I would experience with Anna is
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telling her to take some breaks when caring for her mother so that she will not be overwhelmed.
The way that I will manage my personal values is by not forcing my religion into the session. I
will also be respecting her decisions when it involves her cultural options and treatments.
References
Jordan, P., Shedden-Mora, M. C., & Löwe, B. (2017). Psychometric analysis of the Generalized
Anxiety Disorder scale (GAD-7) in primary care using modern item response
theory. PLOS ONE, 12(8), e0182162. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0182162
Xu, M., Purdon, C., Seli, P., & Smilek, D. (2017). Mindfulness and mind wandering: The
protective effects of brief meditation in anxious individuals. Consciousness and
Cognition, 51, 157–165. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2017.03.009
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders
(5th ed.). American Psychiatric Association.
