Case Study – Jean

Jean (45) has a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. She lives alone and the only member of her family who will contact Jean is her mother Brenda. Brenda does not believe the diagnosis and tells her daughter to pull herself together as there is no history of mental health problems in her family. Although Jean lives independently in the community, she experiences difficulty at times completing everyday tasks, one of which is shopping. You work in a drop-in centre and Jean has contacted you again by telephone from a local supermarket in a very distressed state. She states that she cannot complete her shopping as she thinks everyone is watching her and the shop assistant is talking about her. She contacted her mother but she put the phone down. Thinking about crisis intervention models, what course of action would you take?

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