NURS 6630 WEEK 8 ASSIGNMENT

NURS 6630 WEEK 8 ASSIGNMENT. (Psychopharmacological Approaches to Treat Psychopathology) Pharmacologic Approaches to the Treatment of Insomnia in a Younger Adult Insomnia is classified by difficulty initiating sleep, difficulty maintaining sleep, sleep disturbances that cause significant distress (social, occupational, educational, academic, or behavioral), and symptoms present for three months or more (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). According to the DSM-IV, insomnia is only diagnosed when the patient’s sleep disturbances cannot be better explained by a medical condition such as narcolepsy, sleep apnea, substance abuse, or be caused by a medication (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). Research indicates that 10-15 % of the population suffers from insomnia. The difficulty in diagnosing and treating insomnia is that it is often associated with depression and anxiety (American Psychiatric Association, 2013 & Baglioni et al., 2011). Drug therapy often must address both issues for the patient to be successful and achieve remission. The following paper aims to discuss the decision process used to formulate a treatment plan for a 31-year-old male patient experiencing difficulty falling asleep and staying asleep. The patient’s history indicates that he has always had trouble with sleep but has seen an increase in sleep disturbances since the loss of his fiancé six months ago. The patient has even fallen asleep on his job as a forklift operator. The patient’s medical history also includes opiate abuse as well as his current admission to using alcohol nightly. The patient has tried over the counter sleep aids and has experienced unpleasant side effects. Some ethical considerations that will be discussed for this patient are his drug and alcohol abuse history and his job as a forklift driver. Both will impact what drug therapy is being prescribed. This paper will discuss several different pharmacological options for treating the patient and how each one is either appropriate or not.