ABSTRACT
Introduction It’s 2000h in the emergency department of a large urban hospital in Alberta, Canada. You are a registered nurse working the evening shift (1515-2315h) in the psychiatric assessment department. The phone rings; it is the local police department informing you they are bringing in a 14-year-old male on a Form 10. You groan-another adolescent assessment. You have never been formally trained to deal with adolescents in mental health, and just the thought of having to do an assessment makes you cringe. You ask yourself, “Will it be another case of a teenager just being a teenager? Or will it be a difficult psychiatric case requiring inpatient admission?” You hope for the best and prepare for the worst. A few minutes later, the police escort the patient into the emergency department.
