Mental Health Disorders and How They Manifest with Deaf Patients

If you are a clinician who has never worked with a Deaf patient before, please meet with the interpreter before or after to ask about behaviors that seem unusual to you. There could be cultural or linguistic reasons for the behavior and the interpreter can give you their professional reflection. 

~ Getting their feedback can increase the accuracy of your diagnosis.~

(A real-life example: Deaf people rely on visual environmental information, like we use sound, to receive information about their environment and to determine personal safety.  If a Deaf person turns their head to look at a person who is walking by their window, this is likely explained by that visual need rather than being a result of poor impulse control or being highly distractable. If you aren't familiar with Deaf norms, you could easily use that piece of data to misdiagnose the behavior. A qualified interpreter should be able to identify the difference.)

Helpful PDFs:

• Schizophrenia: An article from the CALI Center about how schizophrenia manifests in the language of people who are deaf.
  

(There is also a brief mention of clanging in the "Interpreter Resources" section.)

• Deaf People and Mental Health ~

• Characteristics of Deaf people who are mentally healthy ~