Psychiatrists and Psychologists are similar but they are not the same. If someone is dealing with mental disorders related to behavior or cognition, they go to see a psychiatrist. Psychiatry is a field that deals specifically with issues related to the mind. This includes mental illness, personality disorders and serious learning disabilities. Psychiatrists are not just charged with identifying these disorders and disabilities. They are also charged with preventing, studying and, of course, treating these issues. Psychiatrists may work in private practice, they can be employed by niche clinics and many are employed by hospitals.
Also commonly referred to as speech therapists, speech pathologists specialize in diagnosing and treating communication and voice issues. But this treatment is not just for patients with stuttering or pronunciation issues. Speech pathologists do help with those types of issues but they also aide patients with issues that range from communicating ideas socially to sentence structure issues and physical voice issues as well. They can even help treat with brain function and cognitive problems, specifically if they affect a patient's voice, communication, or swallowing.
A special division within nursing, psychiatric nursing is specifically about assessing and treating mental health issues within patients or a group of patients. Most psychiatric nurses have master's or doctoral degrees in the field as this is an advanced profession within nursing and requires a more detailed and specialized training and understanding. These nurses usually deal with psychiatric disorders and treat these disorders with specific psychotherapy. They are commonly employed in hospitals and specialty clinics, but many are in private practice as well.
Most think of guidance counselors in the school setting and it is true, most guidance counselors work in schools. But on a more general level, guidance counselors are not just solely responsible with helping students make wise educational and career choices. They can also provide young adults with career advice and help students of all ages adjust socially to the school environment to fulfill their potential in the classroom. They can be found in primary and secondary schools and even in post-secondary institutions as well but many can also be found working career centers and job-placement organizations too.
Licensed professional counselors provide a variety of different kinds of care to patients. LPCs are trained to provide mental, emotional and even physical care for patients suffering from everything from abuse, addiction and even depression. They can work with individuals, couples, or families and really can identify and treat a large swath of issues. Licensed professional counselors are some of the most common mental health professionals in the workplace. They can be employed everywhere from hospitals and community health organizations to elder care facilities and rehab clinics.
Occupational therapy is the practice of creating customized work plans and exercise plans to help people of all ages cure, prevent or deal with things like physical injury, permanent illness or permanent or temporary disability. This is an evidence-based practice that takes a holistic approach to the issues and really helps develop an individually unique plan that caters to the specific issue of the patient. The idea is to develop techniques for helping patients get through their everyday life.
Cognitive behavioral therapy is a type of psychotherapy that takes a practical and tangible approach to solving issues. CBT is designed to help people change the way they think and the way they behave in order to help ease or even solve someone's issues. It is used in a wide variety of cases including things like depression or relationship issues, but its effectiveness stems from its ability to help people think about how their attitudes and beliefs are affecting their behavior. Once that is understood, it can be used to help affect change in that behavior.