ABSTRACT
All psychiatrists are doctors. Their long and arduous training conditions them to base their work on the medical model – namely, the idea that it is the doctor’s function to examine, to diagnose, and to treat. A psychiatric examination, like any medical examination, is designed to elicit signs and symptoms and to establish the history and course of a diagnosable disease. Once a diagnosis is made, a course of treatment is prescribed, and the patient followed up to assess progress, or otherwise, as the case may be.
