Using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders, 5th edition (DSM-5), explain and justify your diagnosis for this client.

 Justifying the Diagnosis Based on DSM-V Criteria

According to American Psychiatric Association (2013), a client is diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder when he/she presents with complaints of excessive worry and anxiety over an event or activity that has occurred for more than 6 months, the client has found it difficult to control the worry and anxiety which may be associated with any three of the following symptoms: easy fatigue, irritability, restlessness, muscle tension, difficulty in paying attention and sleep disturbance.  Besides, a patient’s focus on anxiety should not be associated with panic attacks, social phobia, obsessive-compulsive disorder, separation anxiety disorder or post-traumatic stress disorder(Er, 2015).

The client’s symptoms, worry, and anxiety experienced by a client should cause significant distress that can clinically be observable. These symptoms should cause impairment to a client’s occupational, educational and social functioning (Cuijpers et al., 2014).  Lastly, the symptoms should not be as a result of the direct physiological effects of a substance, medications or an underlying medical illness and should not occur exclusively during a development, psychotic or mood disorder (Stein & Sareen, 2015).

Similarly, in the context of this client, SK presented with the complaints of extreme worry, stress, difficulty to concentrate, a lot of anxiety and thoughts for more than six months and inability to sleep for approximately one month. SK did not abuse drugs, had no chronic underlying medical illnesses and denied having panic attacks. These symptoms resulted in significant social and occupational impairment on her life to an extent that she only wanted to be alone most of the time. Besides, SK had also started performing poorly at work. These signs and symptoms meet the diagnostic criteria for General Anxiety Disorder.

Legal and Ethical Implications Related To Counseling This Client

One of the ethical implications in counseling this client is confidentiality. This client will greatly benefit from individual, group and family counseling. However, the information shared by the client during individual counseling ought to remain confidential during family counseling with her children. This confidentiality limit can only be violated in case the patient proves to be suicidal or self-harm. However, there is a likelihood that at some point during counseling, some confidential information about the divorce will have to be shared with the children. However, information should only be shared with the client’s consent and understanding (Sori & Hecker, 2015).

Another ethical implication is whether the client will be able to make well-informed decisions regarding her involvement in psychotherapy. This means that some of the decisions made by the client might be influenced by emotions and this would only contribute to failure (Sori & Hecker, 2015). However, the client ought to undergo prior counseling to be informed of the positive and negative implications of her decisions regarding treatment before being given the opportunity to make individual decisions.