The Krasner Adolescent Institute six-week assessment program is designed to offer comprehensive, integrative psychiatric assessments for adolescents and young adults with complex mental health problems.
When assessments truly capture clinical realities, willingness and motivation for treatment is catalyzed, consensus among clinicians is generated, and compassionate communication is created. The product of our unique approach to assessment is a more practical, personalized, and sustainable treatment plan that yields enduring and positive results.
The Krasner Adolescent Institute goes beyond traditional data analysis, integrating a comprehensive database of historical clinical information with in-depth interdisciplinary assessments. The result is a blended and nuanced understanding of adolescents and young adults and their families – in essence, our team translates each family’s story.
Our multi-disciplinary team of experts values non-judgmental compassion, attentive clinical engagement, academic rigor, diversity and inclusion, professionalism, and accessibility. The Krasner Adolescent Institute assessment program is an optimistic revision of traditional psychiatric assessment.
Psychosocial Assessment and Data Gathering:
Our data gathering and organization of the clinical history powers the interdisciplinary team’s initial formulation. Our Director of Client Experience will meet individually with each client to conduct a psychosocial assessment. Additionally, she will collaborate with each family to contact previous treatment providers as well as to seek relevant documentation, including previous assessments, educational reports, and extra-curricular assessments. The detailed timeline serves as the backdrop for the program.
Psychiatric Assessment:
Our Chief Psychiatrist will meet with each client to review medical history, psychiatric history, family history of specific psychiatric and/or medical illness, consider genetic testing, and discuss side effects from current medication regimen.
Educational Assessment:
Because our clients are engaged in educational programming, understanding the educational experience is required in cultivating a thorough understanding of an adolescent or young adult. Our Educational Liaison works to understand the interface between academic and social/emotional functioning from a historical and current perspective.
Individual Assessment:
Our Individual Therapist serves as the bridge between the community-based treatment team and our team to ensure a continuation of care and utilization of skills during the assessment program. How each individual client experiences the therapeutic alliance informs our recommendations for on-going treatment.
Neuropsychological Assessment:
Psychological testing integrates clinical, observational, and structured assessments into a systematized formulation that links observable clinical phenomena to brain function. Our Chief Psychologist will determine which tests, both cognitive and social/emotional, will be conducted. He will carefully review any previous testing that has been completed and integrate this information into our formulation.
Family Assessment:
Because our clients remain if not dependent on, then proximal to, their natal families, assessing family function is an important dimension to cultivating an in-depth understanding of client symptoms. The family-based assessment will entail a deep dive into parenting, family dynamics in vivo and in a naturalistic setting, and a provisional assessment of parents as individuals.
Art Assessment:
In certain cases, our Art Therapist will perform several art tasks including self-portraits and family landscapes, using a variety of mediums, to provide a further nuanced assessment of our clients.
Team Collaboration:
To ensure a truly interdisciplinary, integrative process, the full assessment team meets twice weekly to review, in detail, the data and results of the ongoing assessments being conducted by KAI faculty.
Diagnostic Meeting and Treatment Planning:
The culmination of the assessment transpires during a collaborative meeting with the KAI faculty, the family, and the individual client. These meetings are supportive, clarifying, and organizing because all parties gain awareness of the how and why of the psychiatric problems. The focus of the meeting is to explain the diagnostic impression. An ongoing treatment plan, including specific clinicians and/or programs, will be recommended.
Case Management Services:
To ensure the assessment functions to drive treatment implementation and execution, we provide continuing support to the family in the transition from our program to the next steps in clinical care.