Egyptian Board Psychiatry flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Mental status examination

Structured assessment of appearance, behaviour, speech, mood, affect, thought form and content, perception, cognition, insight, and judgement, forming the psychiatric equivalent of the physical examination.

Formal thought disorder

Disturbance in the form of thinking, including derailment, flight of ideas, thought blocking, neologisms, and clang associations, most characteristic of schizophrenia and mania.

Capacity four abilities

Understanding relevant information, appreciating its significance, reasoning about options, and communicating a choice. Capacity is decision-specific and may fluctuate.

Clozapine monitoring schedule

Weekly full blood count for 18 weeks, then fortnightly until one year, then monthly. Also monitor for myocarditis in the first two months and for constipation.

Lithium therapeutic range

Serum lithium 0.6–0.8 mmol/L for maintenance, with toxicity above 1.5. Monitor levels five days after initiation or dose change, plus renal and thyroid function.

Serotonin syndrome

Triad of altered mental state, autonomic hyperactivity, and neuromuscular abnormalities such as clonus and hyperreflexia, caused by serotonergic drugs or combinations.

Exposure and response prevention

First-line psychological treatment for OCD in which the patient is exposed to anxiety-provoking triggers while prevented from performing rituals, allowing habituation.

Motivational interviewing

Client-centred counselling style using open questions, affirmations, reflections, and summaries to explore and strengthen the person's own motivation for change.

Hypomanic episode duration

Elevated or irritable mood with increased energy lasting at least four days, without marked impairment, psychosis, or need for hospitalization.

Mixed features specifier

Presence of at least three manic symptoms during a depressive episode, or depressive symptoms during mania, nearly every day; associated with higher suicide risk.

Schizophrenia duration criterion

Continuous disturbance for at least six months, including at least one month of active symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, or disorganized speech.

Treatment-resistant schizophrenia

Inadequate response to at least two antipsychotics at adequate dose and duration; clozapine is indicated and reduces suicide risk and hospitalization.

Catatonia treatment

Benzodiazepines such as lorazepam are first-line; electroconvulsive therapy is used for refractory cases or when a malignant variant is present.

Panic attack criteria

Abrupt surge peaking within minutes with at least four of palpitations, sweating, trembling, dyspnea, choking, chest pain, nausea, dizziness, derealization, or fear of dying.

PTSD symptom clusters

Intrusion, avoidance, negative cognitions and mood, and altered arousal and reactivity, lasting more than one month after exposure to a traumatic event.

Acute stress disorder

Symptoms lasting three days to one month after trauma, with at least nine of fourteen dissociative, intrusion, avoidance, and arousal symptoms.

Alcohol withdrawal timeline

Tremor and anxiety at 6–24 hours, seizures at 12–48 hours, and delirium tremens at 48–96 hours; treat with benzodiazepines guided by symptom scores.

Wernicke encephalopathy

Confusion, ophthalmoplegia, and ataxia caused by thiamine deficiency; give parenteral thiamine before glucose to prevent precipitation or progression.

ADHD diagnostic threshold

At least six symptoms of inattention or hyperactivity-impulsivity for six months, present before age twelve in at least two settings; five symptoms suffice from age seventeen.

Autism spectrum disorder

Deficits in social communication and interaction plus restricted, repetitive behaviours; language delay is not required, and screening uses the M-CHAT.

Lewy body dementia

Fluctuating cognition, visual hallucinations, parkinsonism, and REM sleep behaviour disorder, with neuroleptic sensitivity; typical antipsychotics should be avoided.

Pseudodementia

Depression presenting with cognitive complaints; patients often emphasize deficits and answer 'don't know', unlike dementia patients who confabulate.

Neuroleptic malignant syndrome

Rigidity, hyperthermia, autonomic instability, and altered consciousness with elevated creatine kinase; stop the antipsychotic and give dantrolene or bromocriptine.

Postpartum psychosis

Psychiatric emergency with onset usually within two weeks of delivery, carrying high risk of suicide and infanticide; requires inpatient care and antipsychotic treatment.

Fitness to stand trial

Ability to understand the proceedings and to assist counsel in one's defence; distinct from the insanity defence, which concerns knowledge of wrongfulness at the time of the act.

Duty to protect

Obligation, when a patient makes a credible threat to an identifiable person, to breach confidentiality to warn the victim and notify authorities.

Incidence versus prevalence

Incidence is new cases per population at risk per time; prevalence is all existing cases at a point or over a period, approximately incidence times duration.

Positive predictive value

Proportion of people with a positive test who truly have the disease; it rises with prevalence and falls when the condition is rare.

Sensitivity and specificity

Sensitivity is true positives divided by all with disease; specificity is true negatives divided by all without disease. Screening favours sensitivity, confirmation favours specificity.

Assertive community treatment

Multidisciplinary team model providing intensive outreach and 24-hour support to people with severe mental illness, reducing hospitalization and improving housing stability.

Case-control study

Observational design comparing past exposure between people with and without an outcome; efficient for rare diseases but vulnerable to recall and selection bias.

Relative risk

Risk in the exposed divided by risk in the unexposed; values above one indicate increased risk, and the odds ratio approximates it when the outcome is rare.