Assignment: Assessing and Treating Pediatric Patients With Mood Disorders Mood disorders can impact every facet of a human being’s life, making the most basic activities difficult for patients and their families. This was the case for 13-year-old Jeanette,

Assignment: Assessing and Treating Pediatric Patients With Mood Disorders Mood disorders can impact every facet of a human being’s life, making the most basic activities difficult for patients and their families. This was the case for 13-year-old Jeanette, who was struggling at home and at school. For more than 8 years, Jeanette suffered from temper tantrums, impulsiveness, inappropriate behavior, difficulty in judgment, and sleep issues. As a PMHNP working with pediatric patients, you must be able to assess whether these symptoms are caused by psychological, social, or underlying growth and development issues. You must then be able to recommend appropriate therapies. This week, as you examine antidepressant therapies, you explore the assessment and treatment of three populations: pediatrics, adults, and geriatrics. The focus of your assessment tool, a decision tree, will specifically center on one of the most vulnerable populations, pediatrics. Please remember, that you must also consider the ethical and legal implications of these therapies amitriptylinebupropioncitalopramclomipraminedesipraminedesvenlafaxinedoxepinduloxetineescitalopramfluoxetinefluvoxamineimipramine ketamine mirtazapine nortriptyline paroxetine selegiline sertraline trazodone venlafaxine vilazodone vortioxetine When pediatric patients present with mood disorders, the process of assessing, diagnosing, and treating them can be quite complex. Children not only present with different signs and symptoms than adult patients with the same disorders, they also metabolize medications much differently. Yet, there may be times when the same psychopharmacologic treatments may be used in both pediatric and adult cases with major depressive disorders. As a result, psychiatric nurse practitioners must exercise caution when prescribing psychotropic medications to these patients. For this Assignment, as you examine the patient case study in this week’s Learning Resources, consider how you might assess and treat pediatric patients presenting with mood disorders. To