Since the patient provides most of the data used to draw conclusions about their psychological status, the first responsibility of any medical-legal evaluator in a psych case is assessing the patient’s credibility. But how does a doctor tell if a patient is being honest and straightforward?

If you’re an attorney, insurance adjuster or another mental health professional what do you look for in the doctor’s report to see if the patient was telling the truth and if the doctor established their credibility?

There are four different places in the report to look for data demonstrating the patient’s credibility: the Mental Status Examination, the patient’s life history and presenting complaints, the psychological testing data and the patient’s medical records.

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