Meaning & use
psychiatric diagnosis
Last updated
Meanings
nouncountablemedical
The official identification by a qualified doctor or psychologist of a mental health condition, based on symptoms and standard criteria.
Grammar: Countable: you can say 'a psychiatric diagnosis' or 'two different psychiatric diagnoses'.
Patterns
- receive a psychiatric diagnosis
- give someone a psychiatric diagnosis
- a psychiatric diagnosis of something
After months of assessment, she finally received a psychiatric diagnosis of depression.
The clinic requires a psychiatric diagnosis before it will approve long-term treatment.
His psychiatric diagnosis changed how the family understood his behavior.
noununcountablemedicalspecialist
The process or professional act of identifying a mental health condition from a patient's symptoms and history.
Grammar: Uncountable when it refers to the activity itself: 'Psychiatric diagnosis takes time and careful observation.'
Patterns
- the process of psychiatric diagnosis
- early psychiatric diagnosis
Psychiatric diagnosis relies on interviews, observations, and agreed checklists.
Early psychiatric diagnosis can help young people get support before problems grow worse.
Word forms
| plural | psychiatric diagnoses |
|---|
Common combinations
- receive a psychiatric diagnosis
- He received a psychiatric diagnosis after being referred by his family doctor.
- confirm a psychiatric diagnosis
- A second specialist was asked to confirm the psychiatric diagnosis.
- a formal psychiatric diagnosis
- Without a formal psychiatric diagnosis, the insurance company would not pay.
- psychiatric diagnosis criteria
- The manual lists the psychiatric diagnosis criteria for each condition.
Synonyms and how they differ
- mental health diagnosis
- A broader, less technical phrase often used in everyday writing; 'psychiatric diagnosis' sounds more clinical and medical.
- assessment
- This refers to the whole evaluation process rather than the named condition that results from it.
Word family
- psychiatrist noun
- A medical doctor who treats mental illness and can make such diagnoses.
- psychiatry noun
- The branch of medicine that deals with mental disorders.
- psychiatric adjective
- Relating to psychiatry or the treatment of mental illness.
- diagnose verb
- To identify an illness or condition after examination.
Commonly confused: psychiatric diagnosis or psychological evaluation?
psychiatric diagnosis vs psychological evaluation
An evaluation is the testing or examination itself; a diagnosis is the conclusion that names a specific condition.
Practice
The doctor needed more information before making a psychiatric ______.
Choose one answer.
'Making a diagnosis' needs the singular noun after 'a'. 'Diagnose' is a verb, 'diagnostic' is an adjective, and 'diagnoses' is plural, so none of them fits after 'a'.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “psychiatric diagnosis”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.