Assessment of clients for counselling and psychotherapy

• My Model of Assessment – an introduction
o Present an introductory section demonstrating your familiarity with the wide ranging literature on client assessment and offer a critical review that justifies the rationale for your model of assessment – ask yourself – Why this model of assessment for this client? Why did I assess the client in this way? What are my influences ?
• Your task is to Illustrate this ‘model’ applied to the assessment of one client

• Introduction to the client
• The task is to produce an assessment report on a client that you have assessed for talking therapy. This report should include a detailed formulation which incorporates the relevant theoretical perspectives you have drawn upon and a rationale for the way you will proceed to work therapeutically with this client.

The client details:
Age: 29th years.
Gender: Male
Ethnicity: British
Sexual orientation: heterosexual
Religion: not known
Number of sessions so far: 6 sessions
Number of sessions of therapy in total: ongoing length
Disability: none
Organisation: The client received counselling therapy at Change Grow Live organisation because of his addicts to alcohol.

Client problems:, childhood trauma, social anxiety and Depression, fear of separation.

• This section should incorporate a consideration of the client’s presenting problem, and the client’s goals for therapy, and an explanation of how you are going to work with this presenting problem and with these goals

What needs to be included
• Relevant information you have found out at assessment which pertains to the client’s presenting problem(s),
• Provide a good exploration of the social context of the client, their background in terms of culture, ethnicity, gender, class, sexuality and any other relevant areas. Consider their access to resources and how all of this information shapes the assessment process for you and the client
• Discuss the context in which you work where you have assessed this client and how this shapes the work taking into consideration yourself as a clinician and your client and an examination of the similarities and/or differences between you
•
The formulation
 The formulation is based on information you obtained at the assessment.
 The formulation provides your understanding of the client in the light of the relevant theory and research which you have chosen to draw upon
 It should also include an exploration of how your own experience of the client has informed your approach
 Your formulation will be influenced by your chosen integrative model
Critical Perspectives
 Critically discuss theory and research relevant to the client’s clinical presentation
 Any prior clinical diagnosis the client has disclosed may be discussed here and reflected on in terms of how you plan to work with the meaning of this diagnostic label for this client
 Discuss the implications of your chosen therapeutic interventions and why you have chosen to work with this client in this way.
 Incorporate a reflection on any discussion you may have had regarding pre-existing diagnostic labels that the client may have been assigned

Meta-Analysis

 Reflect critically on how you conducted the assessment session.
 Demonstrate an understanding of the impact of this assessment session on the client and on the therapeutic relationship.
 If you have continued to work with the client, critically reflect on your ongoing work together including how the relationship has changed over time.
 Through the medium of this meta-analysis, you need to demonstrate your grasp of theory and research findings and their implications for treatment/therapeutic intervention, and to be able to reflect critically on your work with the client.