Citation

Oforeh K, Nkemjika S, Olayinka O, Azim S. Sports Psychiatry 2022; 1(2): 70-72.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, Hogrefe)

DOI

10.1024/2674-0052/a000008

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In sports, the role of a sports psychiatrist is underestimated, their functions with that of sports psychologists are essential and synergistic to the welfare of athletes. However, to date, it appears to have remained uneasy as there has been vice versa condescending tolerance and patronizing among both specialties [1]. Considering that the sports psychologist utilizes the psychosocial angle to cater to athletes [2], the sports psychiatrists are equally important as they use the biological mechanisms to cater to athletes [3, 4]. So far, most sports teams accommodate only sports psychologists [5], but not sports psychiatrists whose roles are very different within the group. Sports psychologists who are more predominant in most professional team setups, could be assumed not to be helpful in accommodating and motivating the essential role of sports psychiatrists in the healthy balance of athletes [1, 6]. Thus, they cater to the psychological and psychiatric needs of athletes, which poses the risk of suboptimal therapeutic management for psychiatric disorders. This suboptimal psychiatric treatment stems from mismanagements and misdiagnosis of athletes [7, 8], which ultimately leads to further decompensation into much acute organic mental disorder and likely loss of career among potential elite athletes [9].

Based on the evidence in literature, the effectiveness of psychological treatments on psychotic disorders has been explored in controlled trials over the last 15 years, which led to the conclusion that they are an important adjunct to antipsychotic medication [10]. However, these studies had mainly been carried out on individuals with chronic treatment-resistant psychosis, where participants had already been stabilized on antipsychotic medication [11, 12]. Thus, there remains little literature on patients with first episode of psychosis. Similarly, there is a gap in sports psychiatry literature on the sequential impact of poor or suboptimal psychological evaluation and assessment based on a team’s psychologist or sole expertise of non-sports psychiatrists among professional and collegiate athletes globally. Hence, we present a case of a young male athlete whose suboptimal evaluation of initial psychiatric symptoms led to subsequent substance use disorder and comorbid first psychotic break and depressed mood.

Language: en