short term and long term goals for depression

3boysmom3 · May 8, 2009

Short-term:

Patient will bathe and dress in street clothes daily.

Patient will attend 2 group therapies daily.

Patient will take medications as prescribed.

Patient will express feelings to one staff member at least once daily.

Long-term:

Patient will be able to maintain job.

Patient will be able to describe at least five effective coping strategies for dealing with stressful situations.

Patient will be involved with aftercare therapy weekly.

Patient will verbalize decreased levels of anxiety.

I'm very rusty at this. These are just ideas, certainly not an exhaustive list. The main thing to keep in mind is that the goals need to be measurable. Short term goals are very short-term; i.e., what can the patient do TODAY. Long term goals extend further into the future. Hope this helps a little!

Whispera, MSN, RN · May 8, 2009

It's important to have long term goals be something you can see happen, if you set them as goals...otherwise how will you evaluate their completion? If you are in outpatient psych, you could have goals like maintaining a job, but if you're inpatient, it doesn't quite work.

So, short term might be something like: will get out of bed tomorrow; will eat at least 50% of all meals today and long term (inpatient) would be the 2nd and last goals in the long-term list above...

sweetness2009 · May 8, 2009

I really appreciate this! Thanks

Whispera, MSN, RN · May 8, 2009

I forgot..you always need to have a time frame in which you hope the goal will be accomplished, such as "by discharge," "by 3rd day of hospitalization," and so on.

3boysmom3 · May 9, 2009

Yup, told you I was rusty! Sounds like the OP is working on care plans... Reminds me, did you ever have to write process recordings in psych class in school, where you sit down and have an interaction with a patient, and then have to write it down word for word as best you can recall; the purpose being so that you can look at your responses to the patient and analyze whether they were therapeutic? ....... and didja ever make minor "creative adjustments" to your paper to change the stupid things you really said? :jester:

Whispera, MSN, RN · May 9, 2009

ahh, process recordings....I would comment but I might have to grumble first!

horrors! you made creative adjustments?? I'm just totally shocked!! ahem...